70 MI Students Win National Merit Scholarships: See New List

Dozens of high school seniors across Michigan were announced as 2026 National Merit Scholarship winners.

This year’s National Merit Scholarship Program began in October 2024 when high school juniors took the PSAT/NMSQT. The highest-scoring participants in each state, representing less than 1 percent of the nation’s high school seniors, were named semi-finalists.

More than 15,000 students became finalists. Ultimately, 6,700 will be named merit scholars.

The scholars were selected by a committee of college admissions officers and high school counselors who sought students with the strongest academic records, contributions and leadership in school and community activities, an essay and recommendation written by a high school official.

There were 70 Michigan students selected from 40 schools across the state. The number is slightly down from last year's 72.

The below winners will receive their $2,500 scholarship directly from the NMSC. They may use their awards at any regionally accredited U.S. college or university.

Michigan winners are below:

Bloomfield Hills High School

• Mayas Smith

Brighton High School

• Ari Hickman

Brother Rice High School, Bloomfield Hills

• Ashton Kallabat

Cranbrook Kingswood School, Bloomfield Hills

• Marina Grace Awad
• Haodong Wei
• Chengyuan Xu
• Michelle Elizabeth Xu
• Shaohuan Zhang
• Anna Wang

Canton High School

• John T. Collins

Detroit Country Day School, Beverly Hills

• Lara Hammoud
• Maya Hammoud
• Ashrita Reddy

Dexter High School

• Claire Madeline Beneteau

East Grand Rapids High School

• Alexander Barnes

East Kentwood High School

• Elijah M. Bernstein

Forest Hills Central High School, Grand Rapids

• Frey Wu

Forest Hills Eastern High School, Ada

• Shriya Nailan Chakravarthi

Grand Ledge High School

• Kuljot Singh

Greenhills School, Ann Arbor

• Christopher Aidan Gregg
• Kate F. Miller
• Ajay Purohit
• Deeksha Sriram

Harper Creek High School, Battle Creek

• Aurora Arendsen

Herbert Henry Dow High School

• Louis Z. Huang

Hillsdale Academy

• James J. Rahe

Houghton High School

• Anna Ruiting Wu

Huron High School, Ann Arbor

• Jiaqi Sophie Huang
• Tanay Panja
• Jessica Wu

International Academy, Bloomfield Hills

• Saanvi Reddy Thippireddy
• Vihaan Gehlaut

International Academy of Macomb, Clinton Township

• Jacob A. DeMoss

Lake Orion High School

• Dylan Chandra

North Farmington High School

• Nolan Barker

Northpointe Christian High School, Grand Rapids

• Joseph Jonathan Rathbun

Northville High School

• Annabelle Beloiu
• Jiaxuan Gong
• Aiden Lee
• Jishnu Kandalam

Novi High School

• Sophia Mirielle Chacko
• Sanjana Ramesh

Okemos High School

• Caefei Tan

Plainwell High School

• Hiro S. Nguyen

Pioneer High School, Ann Arbor

• Minji Kang
• Arthur Lopatin
• Patrick Regan

Plymouth High School

• Aarush I. Kumar

Portage Central High School

• Aanya Goel

Portage Northern High School

• Claire Tong

Rochester Adams High School, Rochester Hills

• Anthony Xie

Rochester High School, Rochester Hills

• Elizabeth Daisy Phillips

Roeper School, Birmingham

• Noah J. Gibbs

Saginaw Arts and Sciences Academy

• Vedha G. Bhola

Salem High School, Canton

• Andrew W. Tai

Saline High School

• Caden Sparks

Seaholm High School, Birmingham

• Spencer Sherr

Skyline High School, Ann Arbor

• Jeffrey Wang

South Lyon East High School

• Saghana Parasuraman

St. Joseph High School

• Henrique Andrade

Troy High School

• Seugheon Lee
• Jaulia Triculescu
• Jonathan D. Xu
• Eric Zhou

University of Detroit Jesuit High School

• Shahzad M. Arshad
• Shiraz Arshad

Utica Academy for International Studies, Sterling Heights

• Alexandria Philip

Washtenaw International High School, Ypsilanti

• Abdarrahim B. Akhilurrahman
• Hasini Anand

West Bloomfield High School

• Neel Kamath

The NMSC, a not-for-profit organization that operates without government assistance, was founded in 1955 specifically to conduct the National Merit Scholarship Program.