Woodstock Student Wins National Merit Scholarship

A Woodstock High School student is one of 2,500 students who have won a highly competitive scholarship.

Samuel J. Mixon was awarded a National Merit $2,500 scholarship from the National Merit Scholarship Corporation, the corporation announced on Wednesday. 

This year’s National Merit Scholar competition began in October 2012 when approximately 1.5 million juniors took the PSAT; then last fall, the 16,000 highest-scoring participants, representing less than 1 percent of the nation’s high school seniors, were named semi-finalists. 

From the semi-finalists, 15,000 students met the very high academic standards and other requirements to advance to the finalist level of the competition.

By the end of the 2014 program, about 8,000 finalists will have earned a scholarship through the competition; various scholarships are provided by the Corporation, colleges and universities and corporate sponsors and foundations. 

Scholars are selected by a committee of college admissions officers and high school counselors, who review a substantial amount of information submitted by both the finalists and their high schools: academic records, including difficulty level of subjects studied and grades earned; scores from two standardized tests; contributions and leadership in school and community activities; an essay written by the finalist; and a recommendation written by a high school official. 

Sam, who plans to study computer science, earned the highest SAT score not only at Woodstock, but also among all seniors in the Cherokee County School District.  

This achievement earned him the title of Woodstock STAR Student and Cherokee County STAR Student.