Front row, left to right: Advait Panicker (MST), Avery Huang (MST), Michelle Quan (J&C), Ayushi Sen (MST), Shriya Kutumbaka (MST), Vaidehi Soni (MST), Swetha Senthil Nathan (MST), Tanishk Natu (MST)
Second row, left to right: Jenny Tang (MST), Ezra Smith-Pohl (YPAS), Edward Jost (YPAS), Madeline Rose (HSU), Lauren Wood (HSU), Gokul Achaththekoot (MST), Mehek Gupta (MST), Andrew Rhee (MST)
Third row, left to right: Sovann Su (MST), Dhiraj Kanneganti (MST), John Rutherford (HSU), Trent Bowman (YPAS), Spandana Pavuluri (MST), Jonah Xu (MST), Luke Mo (MST)
Fourth row, left to right: Salil Kothari (MST), Rajiv Balakrihna (MST), Jackson Shinkle (MST), Jash Pola (MST), Khushi Pola (MST), Christopher Brown (MST)

Out of the 29 semifinalists, 22 are MST students, three are HSU students, three are YPAS students and one is a J&C student.

“I was surprised because I thought I didn’t make the cut-off, “ Madeline Rose (HSU) said. Rose also shared that she felt “proud of myself because I studied a lot for the ACT and it showed with my PSAT scores too.”

“I was incredibly relieved since the wait is so long from the PSAT administration to when they announce results, and I’d been waiting,” John Rutherford (HSU) shared. Rutherford suggested to “try not to stress like I did since it’s about a year wait.”

The number of semifinalists this year is higher than last year, with 28 semifinalists being named last year.