URBANA — Fourteen Uni seniors have been named Commended Students in the 2009 National Merit Scholarship Program, representing 24.6 percent of their 57-member class.

The honored students are:

• Avanti Chajed
• Isaac Chambers
• Robert Diehl
• Jacob Druker
• Elaine Gu
• Noel Knox
• Deborah Ladd
• Sarah Lake-Rayburn
• Cheng Luo
• Sierra Marcum
• Paul Miller
• Stephen Prochaska
• Jessica Stewart
• Brian Wang

Last year, 19 students in the 64-member Class of 2008 received commended status, or 29.7 percent.

In early September, 20 seniors were named National Merit Semifinalists, or 35 percent of the class. In all, 59.6 percent of the Class of 2009 earned National Merit honors as either commended students or semifinalists.

Commended students are named on the basis of the national selection index score of 200. About 34,000 students nationwide received the honor.

According to Director of College Counseling Lisa Micele, the students will not continue in the National Merit Scholarship competition, which is limited to those who were named semifinalists. But they placed among the top 5 percent of the approximately 1.5 million students who took the PSAT/National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test last fall.

This year's junior and sophomore classes will take the PSAT/NMSQT on Oct. 15.