Lewisburg Area student Zachary Timms earns National Merit Scholarship

Zachary Timms has given Lewisburg Area High School a national academic marker with immediate payoff: a National Merit Scholarship that can provide between $500 and $2,000 a year for up to four years at the sponsoring college or university. For a student from Lewisburg, the award is both financial aid and a credential, placing Timms in one of the most selective scholarship pipelines in the country.

National Merit Scholarship Corporation announced more than 2,500 college-sponsored winners on June 3, and Timms was among them. The program will add another group of scholars in July, with the next college-sponsored announcement scheduled for July 13. In all, NMSC says the 2026 competition will offer about 6,930 scholarships worth nearly $26 million, while more than 16,000 students were named Semifinalists. About 95 percent of Semifinalists are expected to reach Finalist standing, and about half of Finalists will win a National Merit Scholarship.

For Lewisburg Area, the recognition lands as a clear sign of academic strength at a school that has been pushing college readiness through a competitive national process. Four Lewisburg Area High School students, Julia Monaco, Benjamin Rogovin, Maya Sak and Timms, were named Semifinalists in the 2026 competition. The school profile for Lewisburg Area High School, at 545 Newman Road in Lewisburg, lists zero National Merit Scholars and zero Finalists in both 2025 and 2024, with two Commended students in 2023, making Timms’ award a notable step forward for the district.

The broader path behind the scholarship helps explain why the honor carries so much weight. NMSC was established in 1955, and the 2026 competition began when juniors took the PSAT/NMSQT in October 2024. Students must then move through Semifinalist and Finalist rounds before scholarship winners are selected, which means the award reflects years of sustained academic performance rather than a single test day.

That matters in Union County, where school success often gets measured not just by test scores, but by how well students are positioned for the next stage. Timms’ scholarship gives Lewisburg Area a visible benchmark for younger students and families, while also signaling that the district’s college-prep pipeline can produce winners in a national competition usually dominated by much larger places.