Jonathan T. Chiu and Rachel M. Kollarmalil of Liberty High School have been named 2025 National Merit $2,500 Scholarship winners.

Chiu and Kollarmalil are two of 2,500 Merit Scholar designees who were “chosen from a talent pool of more than 15,000 outstanding Finalists in the 2025 National Merit Scholarship Program.”

Chiu is planning on studying computer science while Kollarmalil will study medicine.

Winners are chosen from finalists who have been judged to have the “strongest combination” of skills, accomplishments and potential for success in college studies.

The two Liberty seniors’ journey toward winning this scholarship began in fall 2023 with the PSAT/NMSQT exam and then, a year later, being among the country’s semifinalists who were determined by the highest-scoring participants in each state.

There were more than 16,000 semifinalists for the 2025 scholarship. From there, they were part of over 15,000 students who were chosen to be a finalist, who all met the program’s very high academic standards, along with other requirements.

They are joined by several other 2025 National Merit $2,500 Scholarship winners who live in King County:

• Nikolas W. Cornell, Issaquah High School

• Rhett W. Hounsell, Mercer Island High School

• Allison Huang, Mercer Island High School

• Sophia E. Loiselle, Mercer Island High School

• Arin Barde, Eastlake High School

• Robert M. Blendea, The Overlake School

• Sadye E. Derstadt, Lakeside School

• Daniel Y. Liao, Skyline High School

• Manya Pradeep Narayan, Eastlake High School

• Alon Ragoler, Eastlake High School

• Sneha Sharma, Eastlake High School

• Hongning Wang, Eastlake High School