The National Merit Scholarship program has announced its 2017 finalists and two Snoqualmie Valley students are among the Eastside Catholic School honorees. Paul Riddle of Snoqualmie and Samuel Glaze of Duvall join classmates Alexandra Galiotto, Sammamish and Andrew Charters, Woodinville, on the list.

Glaze is also a candidate for the Presidential Scholar award.

Riddle and Glaze both plan to study biology. Galiotto hopes to study environmental engineering, and Charters would like to study either electrical or mechanical engineering.

About 1.6 million juniors, in more than 22,000 high schools, entered the 2017 National Merit Scholarship Program by taking the 2016 Preliminary SAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test, which served as an initial screen of program entrants. The National Merit finalists are among approximately 15,000 high school students nationally who made the list. They are among the top scorers on the Preliminary SAT in the state and represent less than 1 percent of U.S. high school seniors.

The U.S. Presidential Scholars Program recognizes and honors some of the nation’s most distinguished graduating high school seniors. Each year, up to 161 students are named as Presidential Scholars, one of the nation’s highest honors for high school students.