Three seniors at TMI – The Episcopal School of Texas have been named semifinalists in the National Merit Scholarship competition. They are: Hector Castillo, Saad Ehsan and Grace Westerman.

All three students took the PSAT-NMSQT in 2014 and earned among the 16,000 highest scores out of two million students who took the test at that time. As semifinalists, they have qualified to go on in the prestigious scholarship competition.

To advance, semifinalists must maintain an outstanding academic record throughout high school, be recommended by their head of school and earn SAT scores that confirm their earlier performance on the qualifying test. Those who become finalists will be notified in February, and scholarship winners will be selected from that group, to be announced next spring.

Based in Evanston, Ill., the National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) is a nonprofit organization established in 1955 to conduct the National Merit Program. Scholarships are underwritten by NMSC and by business organizations and institutions of higher education.