National Merit semifinalists named

There are nine Kootenai County high school seniors on the 2014 list of semifinalists in the National Merit Scholarship Program.

The nationwide pool of 16,000 semifinalists represents less than 1 percent of high school seniors.

The nine National Merit semifinalists:

Coeur d'Alene Charter Academy - Alyssa Lyn Fortier, William L. Fredericks, Dakota S. Nieland, Louis A. Pennings, Kyle T. Roth, Anna G. Walthar;

Coeur d'Alene High School - Joseph B. Robbins;

Kootenai High School, Harrison - Shannon L. Riley;

Immaculate Conception Academy, Post Falls --Peter Detar.

About 90 percent of the semifinalists are expected to attain finalist standing, and more than half of the finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship, earning the Merit Scholar title. Finalists will receive notification of their designation in February.

Students are selected as National Merit semifinalists based on their scores on the Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test (PSAT)/ National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which they take as juniors. The National Merit Scholarship Corporation reports about 1.5 million juniors in nearly 22,000 U.S. high schools took the test last year.