Fifty-four Loudoun County Public Schools (LCPS) students from 10 LCPS high schools, plus LCPS students attending Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax County, have been named National Merit Scholarship semifinalists.* These LCPS students are among the 16,000 semifinalists in the 72nd annual National Merit Scholarship program. 

More than 1.2 million high school juniors entered the 2027 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2025 PSAT (Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test), which served as the initial screen of program entrants. 

Below are the names of the LCPS National Merit semifinalists:

Briar Woods High School

Nikhil S. Arun 

Anvi Borkar 

Adya Garg 

Aaditya U. Kasture 

Caleb D. Lee 

Parvini S. Naralasetti 

Kaviya Rajkumar

Broad Run High School

Rohan Arun 

Smit N. Gore 

Tanvi Madavarapu 

Pranav Selvamani

John Champe High School

Julian J. Buxhofer

Sahasra Byreddy

Connor J. Gouldey

Jiya Kapoor 

Dominion High School

Dakota A. Man 

Freedom High School 

Aran D. Muhammad 

Kavin Muralikrishnan 

Shreshta Parthaje 

Darren Zhang

Independence High School  

Hudson C. Barkman 

Vaishnavi Chamarti 

Vihaan O. Chanda 

Ridhi Gutta 

Neev C. Shah 

Nathan A. Smothers 

Aneesh Sule 

Sydney Yerra

Lightridge High School

Ragnea Ganjoo 

Jhanvi Reddy Kuchkulla 

Varsha Shankar 

Riverside High School 
Keenan M. Johnson 
Evan C. Saunders
Sarina A. Virmani 

Rock Ridge High School 

Krish Behera 

Evan M. Danh 

Shriyan Dhannode 

Himanshu Ghimire 

Abhinav Karthikeyan 

Saanvi R. Korem 

Praneel Mukherjee

Stone Bridge High School  

Brody P. Drake 

Steven M. Li 

Simran Sahu 

Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology
Supreetha R. Chennuru
Aarush A. Deshpande
Hasini Jasthi
Gia Mehta 
Arya Reddy 
Sahas K. Reddy 
Agastya Sondhi 
Brandon D. Tarrillo 
Jonathan Yang 
Jason C. Zhang

These LCPS semifinalists are eligible to compete for about 6,700 National Merit Scholarships worth nearly $24 million. To be considered for a Merit Scholarship award, semifinalists must fulfill several requirements to advance to the finalist level of the competition. Three types of Merit Scholarship awards will be offered in 2027: National Merit $2,500 scholarships, corporate-sponsored scholarships, and college-sponsored scholarships. Merit Scholarship winners will be announced in phases next spring and summer.

The nationwide pool of semifinalists, which represents less than one percent of U.S. high school seniors, includes the highest-scoring entrants in each state. The number of semifinalists in a state is proportional to the state’s percentage of the national total of graduating seniors. 

* LCPS has an agreement with Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) that allows LCPS students to attend Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology. Although these students attend an FCPS school, they remain LCPS students.