For Alexandra Schieltz, the test wasn’t the hardest part, but the waiting was. 

Schieltz, a senior at Troy High School, has been named a National Merit Semifinalist by the National Merit Scholarship Program. Of the roughly 1.2 million high school juniors who took the PSAT test in the fall of 2025, Schieltz recorded one of the top 16,000 scores in the nation, putting her in the top 1.3 percent of test takers. 

When she finished the test last year, Schieltz said she felt pretty good about her chances of becoming a National Merit Semifinalist, but still had to wait nearly a year for it to become official.

“I’m feeling pretty good,” Schieltz said of becoming a semifinalist. “Not to brag, but I felt like it was a pretty good possibility of it happening. I’ve been checking the timeline on it, wondering when it was going to happen, and now it’s nice that it has come true.” 

Of course, if Schieltz felt confident taking the test, it likely was based on experience taking other standardized tests. 

“I felt like that when I was taking the ACT; I felt like it was low-key pretty easy,” she said. 

Her score on the ACT test proved it was, in fact, easy for Schieltz, as she scored a 36, which is a perfect score. 

Scheiltz said her teachers at Troy High School have played a big part in her continued academic success.

“It’s been great,” she said. “I think my biggest asset has been my teachers, because since freshman year, I’ve taken all of the honors and AP courses that I could, and I think a benefit of that that isn’t talked about is you do get to interact with some of the most intelligent, amazing, caring teachers that we have at THS. So I credit a lot of them. I thank Mr. (Brian) Huelskamp for teaching me a love of geometry, and Mrs.(Brittany) Baker for sticking with me in comp … all of those people.” 

In addition to her academic pursuits, Schieltz is also heavily involved in Troy High School’s music and drama programs. She’s been a member of five school plays or musicals through her junior year and has been in the Drama Club for four years and was the underclassman representative sophomore year. She’s been inducted into the International Thespian Society 

She’s performed in an Ohio Music Education Association Honors Ensemble and received Merit for Supporting Actress from the Miami Valley High School Theater Association. 

She’s been a member of the Troy Tones acapella singing group for three years, was on the Troy swimming team for two years and currently is a member of Reading Buddies and the Writing Club. In her free time, she enjoys working on art projects outside of school. 

As a National Merit Semifinalist, Schieltz will now move on to compete for a National Merit Finalist spot and, eventually, for a National Merit Scholarship. She’ll also continue her high school career with an eye on the future, with dreams of attending an Ivy League university.

“I’m going to apply to a bunch of different colleges and see who gives me money. My dream school, if I could pick anywhere in the world to go, would be Princeton, but I don’t think so, because you have to cure cancer by age 16 to get in, but I’m applying, so we’ll see what happens.”

If she doesn’t get into Princeton, Schieltz knows she’ll pretty much have her pick of most other colleges and universities. While she doesn’t yet know where she’ll end up, she does know what she wants to study when she gets there. 

“After a lot of deliberation, I settled on chemical engineering,” she said. “I’ve always wanted to do something in the mathematics field, and then last year when I took chemistry with Mr. (Jason Orsborne), I really fell in love with the subject.”