Congratulations to senior Michael Thomas, who has been named a National Merit Scholarship Finalist for 2021. Thomas is Saint Stephen’s 16th finalist since 2016. About 1.6-million students in some 22,000 high schools enter the National Merit Scholarship competition annually when they take the Preliminary SAT, measuring critical reading ability, mathematics problem solving, and writing ability. Semifinalists are selected on a state-by-state basis and represent the top 0.5 percent of the state’s senior students. Of the 15,000 Finalists, about 8,000 untimately receive Merit Scholarship awards. This year, SSES also added five NMS Commended Scholars: Madeline Cashen, Caroline Gans, Connor Grindal, Tyler Kadivar, and Luke Phommachanh.