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Woodstock Graduate Awarded National Merit Scholarship

Etowah High School graduate Philip Litrel wins scholarship from Georgia Tech.

Philip T. Litrel of Woodstock, is among some 2,000 winners nationwide of National Merit Scholarships announced Monday.

Litrel, a graduate of Etowah High School, received the college-sponsored scholarship from Georgia Institute of Technology. Litrel will study business management at Georgia Tech, according to the announcement from the National Merit Scholarship Corp.

Georgia Institute of Technology is a state-supported institution located in Atlanta with a total enrollment of approximately 13,000 students, 3,500 are in graduate programs. Tech offers more than 25 different degree programs for undergraduates in Engineering, Science, Architecture, and Industrial Management. Most of these fields also offer the graduate degree. Students come from all 50 states and over 50 foreign countries.

Litrel is the only Cherokee County resident and one of only 60 from Georgia to receive a National Merit scholarship in this round of awards, according to the National Merit Scholarship Corp. announcement.

In late May the National Merit Scholarship Corporation designated student recepients of more than 2,500 other college-sponsored awards. This group of winners announced Monday brings the number of 2012 National Merit Scholars to approximately 8,100. These high school graduates will receive scholarships for undergraduate study worth a total of over $35 million.

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Litrel and the other award winners began competing for their National Merit Scholarships two years ago when approximately 1.5 million juniors in some 22,000 high schools took the 2010 Preliminary sat/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants.

In September 2011, about 16,000 Semifinalists were named on a state representational basis in numbers proportional to each state’s percentage of the national total of graduating high school seniors. Semifinalists were the highest-scoring program entrants in each state and represented less than one percent of the nation’s seniors.

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To become a Finalist, each Semifinalist had to submit a detailed scholarship application, which included writing an essay and describing leadership positions and contributions in school and community activities, showing an outstanding academic record, and being endorsed and recommended by a high school official. Semifinalists also had to take the sat and earn scores that confirmed their performance on the initial qualifying test. From the Semifinalist group, about 15,000 attained Finalist standing, and more than half of the Finalists were chosen to receive National Merit Scholarships.

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