Township Resident Wins National Scholarship
Obianuju A. Enworom, a senior at Mt. St. Mary’s Academy in Watchung, is one of 700 students nationwide to win a National Achievement Scholarship.
Enworom, whose probable field of study is law, was awarded $2,500 by the program, which is administered by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation.
Enworom was part of the 2013 Mt. St. Mary’s Mock Trial Team which won the Somerset County Mock Trial Competition.
The 50-year-old National Achievement award is a privately financed competition established to honor and provide scholarships for academically talented black American high school seniors. The award is funded by grants from 31 corporations and professional organizations and the National Merit Scholarship Corporation.
All students who advanced to the finalist level in the 2014 National Achievement competition were considered for the single-payment scholarships, which were awarded on a regional representation basis in proportion to the population of Black Americans in each geographic region, according to a press release about the program.
More than 160,000 student entered the 2014 National Achievement Scholarship Program when they took the Preliminary SAT tests in 2013.
In September 2013, approximately 1,600 of the highest scorers were named semifinalists on a regional representation basis, according to teh release. To continue in the competition, semifinalists had to fulfill requirements for finalist standing, which included having a record of consistently high academic performance, being endorsed and recommended by an official from their high school, earning SAT scores that confirmed their PSAT/NMSQT performance, and writing an essay.
From the semifinalist pool, about 1,300 students advanced to the finalist level, and the 800 National Achievement Scholarship winners were selected from this group of students, the release said.
Achievement Scholar awardees are the finalist candidates judged to have the strongest record of accomplishments and greatest potential for academic success in college, the release said.