Stephen Groh, son of Stephen and Gina Groh, of Jefferson County, was named a National Merit Scholarship winner the week. The 2,500 Merit Scholar designees were chosen from a talent pool of more than 15,000 outstanding finalists in the 2016 National Merit Scholarship Program.

These scholars were selected by a committee of college admissions officers and high school counselors, who appraised a substantial amount of information submitted by both the Finalists and their high schools: the academic record, 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.

This year’s competition began in October 2014 when over 1.5 million juniors in some 22,000 high schools took the Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test (PSAT/NMSQT). Last fall, the highest-scoring participants in each state, representing less than one percent of the nation’s high school seniors, were named Semifinalists on a state-representational basis.

Only these 16,000 Semifinalists had an opportunity to continue in the competition.

Only15,000 students met the standards to advance to the Finalist level of the competition. By the conclusion of the 2016 program, about 7,500 Finalists will have earned the “Merit Scholar” title and received a total of about $33 million in college scholarships.

Groh has been accepted to Harvard for the fall of 2016 where he will study medicine.