National Merit semi-finalists named

More than a dozen local students were named semi-finalists in the 2013 National Merit Scholarship Program.

Students from Costa Mesa, Newport Harbor and Corona del Mar high schools, and Sage Hill School were among 16,000 high schoolers recognized for their high academic achievements by the 58th annual National Merit Scholarship Program.

The semi-finalists will be whittled down over the coming months to finalists and then National Merit winners.

Semi-finalists include:

Corona del Mar: Sophia Y. Chen, Darya Fadavi and Nicholas R. Furgatch.

Costa Mesa: Quan N. Nguyen.

Newport Harbor: Kelsey Christensen and Jamison Searles.

Sage Hill: Kimberly Brown, Yoonseo Cha, Darren A. Chen, Maxwell Davitt, Liana C. Korber, Alice Y. Liu, Brennon K. Mendez and Tiffany L. Siverstein.

—Britney Barnes

Twitter: @britneyjbarnes