Seventeen MCPS seniors have been selected as candidates for the 2001 Presidential Scholars awards, one of the highest honors given to high school seniors in the United States.

The local students were selected from nearly 2.8 million high school seniors nationwide for their exceptionally high scores on the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT) or the American College Testing (ACT) assessment. Nationwide, more than 2,600 candidates were chosen, 47 of them from Maryland.

The local candidates are:

- Montgomery Blair High School: Daniel Bates, Ashutosh Sahu, Roman Goldstein, Daniel Church, William Pastor and Ashley Newman Owens

- Winston Churchill High School: Shuen Chai

- Col. Zadok Magruder High School: Sara Podolsky

- Richard Montgomery High School: Kirill Lokshin, Stephanie Lin, Elizabeth Whitman, Damaris Yeh and Julia Galef

- Walt Whitman High School: Vivek Muralidhar, Amy Wickner and Nicholas Masiewicki

- Thomas S. Wootton High School: Lewei Lin

In April, a panel of educators will select 500 semifinalists on the basis of their essays, self-assessments, descriptions of activities, school recommendations and school transcripts.

The White House Commission on Presidential Scholars will select one young man and one young woman from each state, the District of Colombia, Puerto Rico and U.S. students living abroad; up to 20 students from the creative and performing arts; and 15 students at-large. The U.S. Department of Education will announce the scholars in May.

Scholars will be invited to Washington, D.C. in June to receive the Presidential Scholars medallion at a recognition ceremony and to participate in activities.