Exeter, NH (February 6, 2008)—Twenty-five PEA seniors have been named finalists in this year's National Merit Scholarships, competing to be a recipient among 8,200 Merit Scholarship awards, worth $34 million, which will be offered next spring. Close to 90 percent of the 16,000 Semifinalists are expected to make it to Finalist standing; and about half of those—a little more than 7,000—will earn the title of Merit Scholar.

PEA 2008 Merit Scholarship Finalists: 

Vivek A. Agarwala                  Brian T. Basham Sean E. Beckett Laura A. Blake Tara I. Burton Ja-Yoon Choe Libbie D. Cohn Manning Ding John T. Ettinger Lynn Ann Forrester Naomi C. Funabashi                      Yingyu Gao     Yi Han

Albert Kao James D. Karraker                  Anna C. Kelly Eric M. LaPointe Owen C. McAleer Sekhar R. Paladugu Jaime L. Piedra Anne T. Pope Alison K. Rittershaus Nicholas J. Spanier Joshua M. Taylor                     Francisco L. Unger

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Phillips Exeter Academy is a coeducational, independent preparatory school that was founded in 1781 and originated the system of instruction known as Harkness teaching in 1931. In the spirit of its charter to foster both goodness and knowledge, a Phillips Exeter Academy education will now be free to any admitted student whose family income is $75,000 or less. Committed to educational excellence, the school meets all demonstrated financial aid needs of its admitted students, making the Academy effectively “need blind.” The diverse student body comes from a wide variety of geographic, economic, racial and religious backgrounds approximately from 45 states, the District of Columbia, the Virgin Islands and 23 foreign countries.