The exterior of Bellaire HS

At 36 National Merit Semifinalists, Bellaire High School increased their awardees by 100% to be the top performing public school in the metro area; photo by Satterfield & Pontikes.

National Merit Scholarship Corporation (NMSC) has announced the semifinalists in their 63rd National Merit Scholarship Program. Semifinalists are current high school seniors who took the PSAT in October of 2016 and scored among the top 1% in their respective states.

(This list is for the Class of 2018. For the competition for the Class of 2019, click here.)

In Houston, Bellaire High School, Carnegie Vanguard, and Memorial High School each had a massive nearly 100% increase in winners versus last year. Conversely, Clements High School saw a nearly 26% year-over-year decline.

To win the coveted “Semifinalist” designation in Texas, students must have earned a “selection index” score of 221 out of 228, which is equivalent to a 1480 out of 1600 SAT composite score. To put this rare achievement into perspective, Texas juniors could have missed no more than 3 out of 47 questions in Reading, 2 out of 44 questions in Writing and Language, and 4 out of 48 questions across both Math sections.

Semifinalists are eligible for more than 1,000 corporate-sponsored scholarships and 4,000 college-sponsored scholarships and can even get full rides to some Texas schools like University of Houston, Baylor, UT Arlington, UT Dallas, UT Tyler, UNT Dallas, Abilene Christian, and Lubbock Christian.

Out of 1.6 million juniors entering the competition by taking the PSAT, approximately 16,000 students score in the top 1% to earn the designation “Semifinalist,” and about 90% of these will go on to become “National Merit Finalists.” Only 2500 students will earn a $2,500 scholarship and the title National Merit Scholar.

General Academic has confirmed directly with NMSC that the cutoff score for obtaining “Semifinalist” designation in Texas was a 221 and a 211 for Commended. 

The 2018 Houston-Area Semifinalists Winners

This list includes Houston, Humble, Katy, Kingwood, League City, Pearland, Sugarland, and The Woodlands.

Note that the three digit number before a student’s name is their self-selected “College Major Career Code.” 999 means undecided; click here for the explanation to all codes.

ATASCOCITA H. S.

  1. 999 Trambaugh, Hunter R.

AWTY INTERNATIONAL SCHOOL (+2 vs 2017)

  1. 000 Grosvenor, Eleanor C.
  2. 742 Lewis, Brandon I.
  3. 000 Meacham, Mary M.
  4. 000 Yao, Jason L.

BELLAIRE H. S. (+18 vs 2017)

  1. 904 Brown, Robert A.
  2. 160 Contello, Rachel M.
  3. 628 Dai, Eric J.
  4. 000 Entchev, Daniel P.
  5. 600 Han, Evan Y.
  6. 467 Ho, Alexander J.
  7. 455 Huang, Jasmine L.
  8. 000 Jin, Wendy
  9. 999 Kelly, Patrick M.
  10. 843 Kharel, Tirtha M.
  11. 467 Levitt, Christopher I.
  12. 450 Lin, Michelle M.
  13. 161 Ling, Ruth
  14. 450 Macia, Sarah E.
  15. 999 McAuliffe, Skylar N.
  16. 628 Nguyen, Alexander K.
  17. 843 Olinger, Gabrielle D.
  18. 999 Pan, Emily Y.
  19. 999 Parsons, Charlotte M.
  20. 628 Parsons, Mackenzie L.
  21. 457 Parsons, Rebecca C.
  22. 630 Richards, Emily P.
  23. 843 Shukla, Pavan A.
  24. 999 Sood, Kabir
  25. 628 Su, Samantha L.
  26. 905 Szafranski, Elizabeth R.
  27. 710 Tate, Jacob M.
  28. 741 Uraimov, Omar
  29. 204 Wen, Sarah J.
  30. 302 Williams, Scott S.
  31. 454 Xin, Jingyi
  32. 628 Xu, Anna C.
  33. 999 Xu, Jennifer
  34. 451 Yuan, Yuanchen
  35. 160 Zheng, Julia J.
  36. 892 Zimmerman, Geoffrey W.

CARNEGIE VANGUARD H. S. (+8 vs 2017)

  1. 630 Bailey, Cassandra L.
  2. 454 Devashish, Kartik
  3. 906 Feldman, Amanda H.
  4. 202 Holmes, Garrett M.
  5. 999 Hsu, Caitlin
  6. 740 Jajoo, Anuj K.
  7. 168 Jessup, Raymond J.
  8. 710 Jung, Hee Soo
  9. 906 Kalamangalam, Rukmini
  10. 472 Karam, Matthew J.
  11. 472 Keneally, Riordan K.
  12. 204 Khosla, Griffin R.
  13. 161 Liu, Samuel W.
  14. 743 Nguyen, An K.
  15. 454 Omidiran, Ifeoluwani E.
  16. 999 Powers, Katherine F.
  17. 628 Srivaths, Keshav S.

CINCO RANCH H. S. (+1 vs 2017)

  1. 200 Ding, Ruihua
  2. 836 Gadiyar, Shruti
  3. 301 Kong, Alex H.
  4. 600 Ku, Russell Y.
  5. 999 Lee, Ji Won
  6. 600 Lee, Michelle S.
  7. 302 Li, Laura C.
  8. 162 Liu, Tommy B.
  9. 455 Rooney, Abigail E.
  10. 454 Tian, Michael Q.
  11. 160 Wang, Amy
  12. 999 Xu, Elizabeth H.
  13. 940 Yang, Alice J.
  14. 999 Yang, Julia Yuxuan
  15. 302 Yang, Melissa J.
  16. 999 Yuk, Kevin K.

CLEAR CREEK H. S.

  1. 454 Biggerstaff, Alec
  2. 904 Lindberg, Scott T.
  3. 164 McCarty, Margaret E.
  4. 160 Raji, Michael O.

CLEAR FALLS H. S.

  1. 161 Abate, Alex S.
  2. 843 Wen, Allen C.

CLEAR HORIZONS EARLY COLLEGE H. S.

  1. 628 Albustami, Ayah O.
  2. 457 Beaty, Aaron C.
  3. 160 Vo, Ryan T.

CLEAR LAKE H. S. (+3 vs 2017)

  1. 628 Alrahwan, Ian M.
  2. 300 Baylor, Travis J.
  3. 999 Dong, Steven R.
  4. 454 Edelen, John
  5. 940 Enriquez, Samuel
  6. 457 Glaze, Nicholas K.
  7. 628 Huynh, Courtney
  8. 999 Krishna, Gayathri M.
  9. 742 Mokkala, Sravan R.
  10. 451 Muffoletto, Karina L.
  11. 455 Nesbitt, Benjamin R.
  12. 217 Rao, Ankita V.
  13. 450 Sahnoune, Youcef H.
  14. 501 Skaggs, Grant S.
  15. 454 Soltes, Amelia M.
  16. 627 Theriot, Dylan D.
  17. 163 Truong, Meghan
  18. 450 Wong, Yan Hao

CLEAR SPRINGS H. S.

  1. 161 Baetz, Elijah W.
  2. 628 Jeon, Young Hee
  3. 160 Lee, Ka Yeon
  4. 843 McGuire, Lauren K.
  5. 999 Nguyen, Christopher T.
  6. 843 Nguyen, Daniel T.
  7. 162 Stewart, Valerie E.

CYPRESS CREEK H. S.

  1. 302 Matson, Ian
  2. 302 Sanders, Lorna N.

CY – FAIR H. S.

  1. 121 Griffith, Christopher P.
  2. 628 Moturu, Amar E.
  3. 160 Selz, Evelyn J.

CYPRESS FALLS H. S.

  1. 465 Xu, Aaron J.

CYPRESS LAKES H. S.

  1. 450 Nguyen, Terry

CYPRESS RANCH H. S.

  1. 999 Kumar, Carissa N.
  2. 455 Seaver, Thomas M.
  3. 300 Wang, Andrew A.

CYPRESS RIDGE H. S. (+2 vs 2017)

  1. 600 Kim, Minjung
  2. 450 Leger, Juliet M.
  3. 628 Wang, William J.

CYPRESS WOODS H. S. (+3 vs 2017)

  1. 168 Bozinov, Vincent P.
  2. 302 Cheng, Meggie L.
  3. 450 Jonnalagadda, Chakra P.
  4. 461 Kothi, Gandhar A.
  5. 454 Speight, Claire E.
  6. 451 Tighe, George P.

DARUL ARQAM NORTH ZONE SCHOOL

  1. 168 Syed, Hafsa A.

DULLES H. S. (-3 vs 2017)

  1. 160 Almus, Kadriye
  2. 450 Armendariz, Sara
  3. 450 Bhavani, Nikitha
  4. 160 Chow, Elsbeth
  5. 162 Diwanji, Palak
  6. 628 Gattu, Nikhil
  7. 628 Hu, Alice
  8. 302 Kassam, Amsal
  9. 870 Ma, Candice
  10. 461 Mehrani, Jaanita
  11. 450 Mitra, Kenneth
  12. 870 Mukkamala, Swara
  13. 162 Nguyen, Brittany
  14. 185 Ni, Star
  15. 455 Sackett, Abigail
  16. 770 Thipireddy, Shreya
  17. 907 Tuppera, Tejas
  18. 455 Zhang, Jeffrey

EPISCOPAL H. S.

  1. 000 Allan, Sophie C.
  2. 999 Cook, Aidan S.
  3. 000 Edwards, Avery L.
  4. 000 Graves, Aaron P
  5. 000 Ogle, Blake E.

DUCHESNE ACADEMY OF THE SACRED HEART (-1 vs 2017)

  1. 550 Swackhamer, Sarah W.

FORT BEND CHRISTIAN ACADEMY

  1. 943 Brown, Kelsey M.

GLENDA DAWSON H. S. (+7 vs 2017)

  1. 870 Chen, Grace H.
  2. 870 Chen, Kevin
  3. 209 Dave, Ashish S.
  4. 628 Derasari, Shrey J.
  5. 451 Ellinger, Molly E.
  6. 160 Hong, Elizabeth H.
  7. 628 Lavu, Chaitanya V.
  8. 451 Lewandowski, Christian R.
  9. 710 Liu, Julie
  10. 463 Moore, Abigail G.
  11. 162 Ram, Adith V.
  12. 743 Salvador, Sarah E.
  13. 450 Srinivasan, Shruthi
  14. 999 Tran, Tabitha D.
  15. 455 Vines, William E.
  16. 907 Yordy, Katherine A.
  17. 628 Yu, Jennifer X.
  18. 712 Yusuf, Benjamin J.

HARMONY SCHOOL OF ADVANCEMENT (+1 vs 2017)

  1. 459 Ahmad, Shujah A.
  2. 628 Ba, Brandon A.
  3. 870 Yucel, Feyza B.

HARMONY SCHOOL OF INNOVATION

  1. 843 Long, Morgan S.
  2. 600 Scott, Tanner M.

HIGH SCHOOL FOR THE PERFORMING AND VISUAL ARTS (-2 vs 2017)

  1. 467 Fu, Trevor Z.
  2. 628 Haynes, Tuesday B.
  3. 303 Jalbert, Jonathan J.
  4. 628 O’Connor, Caroline E.

HOMESCHOOL

  1. 162 Hodes, Hannah B.
  2. 000 Lee, Melissa Anne M.
  3. 950 Luo, Joanna F.

HOUSTON CHRISTIAN H. S. (-1 vs 2017)

  1. 472 Dupree, Amy K.
  2. 454 Read, Ashley E.

INCARNATE WORD ACADEMY

  1. 453 Diamond, Elizabeth M.

JAMES E. TAYLOR H. S. (+1 vs 2017)

  1. 628 Bandyopadhyay, Argha
  2. 301 Blount, Reese A.
  3. 450 Choi, Inyoung
  4. 457 Cortes, Santiago
  5. 999 Kim, Isaac Y.
  6. 894 Laetsch, John
  7. 218 Larkin, Alanna D.
  8. 999 Liu, Emily F.
  9. 999 Llopiz, Leonardo
  10. 843 Matava, William J.
  11. 999 Tang, Shirley C.
  12. 999 Wang, Laurence N.
  13. 710 Wong, Jodi J.

JERSEY VILLAGE H. S. (+4 vs 2017)

  1. 450 Flores, Helaman R.
  2. 455 Huang, Shan Shan
  3. 467 Nguyen, Kathy Khuyen V.
  4. 600 Pham, Erik
  5. 303 Tran, Stephanie

JOHN COOPER SCHOOL (-6 vs 2017)

  1. 000 Masuelli, Carina R.

KINGWOOD H. S.

  1. 161 Cates, Allison D.
  2. 454 Crane, Carson J.
  3. 600 Khan, Aliya S.
  4. 628 Leal, Leslie M.
  5. 450 Smith, Kaitlin E.
  6. 771 Smith, Molly M.
  7. 201 Stroud, Carly A.
  8. 200 Walton, William L.
  9. 501 Zhuang, Brent X.

KLEIN COLLINS H. S.

  1. 830 Bowering, Joseph C.
  2. 803 Evans, Owen S.

KLEIN OAK H. S. (+5 vs 2017)

  1. 904 George, Alan J.
  2. 209 Nguyen, Alexander Q.
  3. 628 Nguyen, Nicholas B.
  4. 455 Rodriguez, Porfirio
  5. 770 Roy, Anwesha
  6. 628 Sudhakaran, Rhea
  7. 455 Summers, Zachary
  8. 628 Tran, Michelle K.

JERSEY VILLAGE H. S. (+4 vs 2017)

  1. 450 Flores, Helaman R.
  2. 455 Huang, Shan Shan
  3. 467 Nguyen, Kathy Khuyen V.
  4. 600 Pham, Erik
  5. 303 Tran, Stephanie

KINKAID SCHOOL (-1 vs 2017)

  1. 000 Ghei, Jiya
  2. 000 Ho, Lauren T.
  3. 000 Kunetka, William
  4. 000 Rice, Lauren E.
  5. 000 Rome, Hayden M.
  6. 000 Schwager, Haley F.
  7. 000 Segal, Samuel R.
  8. 000 Thomas, Anna E.
  9. 000 Tilney, Charles M.

LANGHAM CREEK H. S.

  1. 999 Andrews, Gavin R.
  2. 999 Ferrell, Camden M.
  3. 742 Young, Amanda B.

DR. KIRK LEWIS CAREER AND TECHNICAL H. S.

  1. 461 Ly, Kevin D.

LOGOS PREPARATORY ACADEMY

  1. 712 Maganza, Renae C.

LUTHERAN SOUTH ACADEMY

  1. 303 Leimkuehler, Andrew N.

MEMORIAL H. S. (+10 vs 2017)

  1. 710 An, Hannah J.
  2. 450 Burns, Paolo A.
  3. 720 Cheng, Claire
  4. 121 Cowan, Sarah Y.
  5. 999 Creed, Chloe M.
  6. 740 Curry, Samuel
  7. 201 Dou, Wenxuan
  8. 906 Foster, Kendrick N.
  9. 467 Halbert-Elliott, Kyra M.
  10. 600 Herbst, Eliot
  11. 201 Hurley, Robert C.
  12. 900 Jacobs, Eva
  13. 459 Landa, Albert S.
  14. 300 Li, Ellen
  15. 450 Ling, Natalie R.
  16. 450 Nguyen, Pierce L.
  17. 907 Noyola, Pablo P.
  18. 168 Qin, Emily Y.
  19. 628 Sands, Chloe
  20. 628 Weber, Ronald M.
  21. 162 Wright, Nicole M.

MICHAEL E. DE BAKEY H. S. FOR HEALTH PROFESSIONS (-6 vs 2017)

  1. 000 Belaguli, Sidharth N.
  2. 000 Kilicarslan, Elif Naz
  3. 000 Kotha, Aishwarya S.
  4. 000 Mo, William T.
  5. 000 Nitturi, Vijay
  6. 000 Ou, Eric
  7. 000 Pham, Jacqueline D.
  8. 000 Schroeder, Vera M.
  9. 000 Xue, Brian
  10. 000 Yeh, Mason A.
  11. 000 Zhang, Larry W.

MIRABEAU B. LAMAR H. S. (+1 vs 2017)

  1. 900 Calabrese, Camille R.
  2. 629 Han, Jiayuan

OBRA D. TOMPKINS H. S. (+1 vs 2017)

  1. 999 Jiang, Ella A.
  2. 990 Kataram, Srisai Rachana
  3. 999 Knapp, Tyler L.
  4. 300 Kumar, Varsha
  5. 999 Nguyen, Dat M.
  6. 160 Orozco, Maria F.
  7. 160 Punia, Viraaj S.
  8. 456 Sequeira, Sneha N.
  9. 712 Toong, Ping Rui

PEARLAND H. S. (+1 vs 2017)

  1. 999 Moore, Rachel C.
  2. 204 Smith, Jessalyn E.

PROVIDENCE CLASSICAL SCHOOL

  1. 467 Overcash, Joshua P.

QUEST EARLY COLLEGE H. S.

  1. 466 Thomas, Andrew

SEVEN LAKES H. S. (+4 vs 2017)

  1. 164 Chakraborty, Ashish D.
  2. 454 Daboin, Claudia N.
  3. 303 Feng, Jixuan
  4. 160 Gao, Kevin
  5. 455 Garfias, Louis F.
  6. 904 Jadhav, Som M.
  7. 999 Kim, Jun-Yong
  8. 999 Kyoung, Kyouar
  9. 300 Li, George Y.
  10. 459 Liu, Dennis
  11. 999 Liu, Hannah
  12. 160 Liu, Sophie R.
  13. 457 Luo, Bruce Y.
  14. 160 Paidisetty, Praneet S.
  15. 450 Rydahl, Thor A.
  16. 450 Shui, Roger H.
  17. 450 Srinivasan, Hrishikesh S.
  18. 454 Thigpen, Brett M.
  19. 451 Tia, Joshua
  20. 999 Wang, Zachary
  21. 164 Wu, Kevin W.
  22. 200 Yang, Amy Q.
  23. 454 Yang, Haechan
  24. 836 Yang, Saebin
  25. 450 Ye, Jennings Z.

SHADOW CREEK H.S.

  1. 999 Crews, Austin

ST. AGNES ACADEMY (+4 vs 2017)

  1. 999 Cho, Claire
  2. 710 Covington, Alexis
  3. 999 Faison, Alexandra M.
  4. 999 Farr, Megan E.
  5. 712 Fitzsimmons, Makenna R.
  6. 999 Koch, Irene E.
  7. 830 Kuryla, Anna S.
  8. 303 Lord, Hannah C.
  9. 162 Meyne, Grace M.
  10. 185 Steier, Maureen E.
  11. 894 Sutter, Sophia R.

ST. JOHN’S SCHOOL (-5 vs 2017)

  1. 454 Awad, Elizabeth G.
  2. 160 Bandi, Ashwini V.
  3. 200 Blue, Grace J.
  4. 455 Boom, John
  5. 999 Boroughs, Zachary D.
  6. 999 Brown, Jacob K.
  7. 000 Buckman, Alexander J.
  8. 300 Buckman, Peter J.
  9. 463 Burnette, Cameryn A.
  10. 999 Cerda, Lauren E.
  11. 455 Chakraborty, Riya
  12. 999 Chen, Emily J.
  13. 999 Chen, William J.
  14. 999 Coudsi, John
  15. 204 Donovan, Samuel R.
  16. 160 Fenouil, Julien M.
  17. 501 Harraman, Carson R.
  18. 450 He, Michael X.
  19. 999 Hlavinka, Joseph W.
  20. 836 Ho, Samuel Y.
  21. 999 Jackson, Sean T.
  22. 999 Jing, Katherine G.
  23. 000 Jung, Jaehoon
  24. 600 Kernell, Caroline G.
  25. 999 Kim, Alexander M.
  26. 300 Kramer, Jordan E.
  27. 467 Laborde, Mark E.
  28. 999 Laniyan, Oluwalayomi O.
  29. 303 Louie, Kurt T.
  30. 200 McKelvey, Laurel
  31. 450 Morris, Avery L.
  32. 955 Ragauss, Emily A.
  33. 999 Roffwarg, Jacob G.
  34. 250 Still, Henry
  35. 700 Tyler, Lucas B.
  36. 999 Waller, Julia A.
  37. 907 Wan, Andrew Z.
  38. 999 Yan, Dani
  39. 553 Zhang, Olivia R.

ST. JOHN XXIII COLLEGE PREPARATORY

  1. 430 Parmenter, Bridget A.
  2. 455 Poux, Emily A.

ST. STEPHEN’S EPISCOPAL SCHOOL

  1. 970 Warren, Claire E.

ST. THOMAS EPISCOPAL SCHOOL (-3 vs 2017)

  1. 999 Fueyo-Gomez, Juan

ST. THOMAS H. S. (+1 vs 2017)

  1. 740 Castillo, Juan M.
  2. 628 Dang, Kenneth
  3. 457 Gottschalk, Cooper T.
  4. 200 Patton, Michael T.

STEPHEN F. AUSTIN H. S. (+2 vs 2017)

  1. 302 Bethke, Ryan
  2. 218 Ji, Christina
  3. 301 Li, Victor
  4. 843 Paluri, Lakshmi
  5. 602 Patel, Amy
  6. 209 Tan, Daniel
  7. 999 Trinh, Andy Sang

STRAKE JESUIT COLLEGE PREPARATORY (-3 vs 2017)

  1. 000 Athaide, Edward J.
  2. 000 La, Troy M.
  3. 000 Li, Charles

STRATFORD H. S. (+1 vs 2017)

  1. 830 Baring, Geoffrey O.
  2. 164 Harms, Madeline N.
  3. 999 Mouton, Mary K.

VILLAGE SCHOOL (+4 vs 2017)

  1. 999 Beilstein, Christopher M.
  2. 906 Hutsell, William M.
  3. 999 Liu, Alex
  4. 160 Menon, Simren R.
  5. 160 Patel, Reshmi J.
  6. 450 Ramirez, Federico
  7. 999 Zhang, Angela

WESTCHESTER ACADEMY OF INTERNATIONAL STUDIES

  1. 720 Zong, Charlie A.

WESTSIDE H. S.

  1. 742 Chen, Hsin-Wei
  2. 520 Hudson, Sarah G.

WILLIAM P. CLEMENTS H. S. (-11 vs 2017)

  1. 214 Aranke, Nishant
  2. 160 Chang, Angela
  3. 451 Chang, Anthony
  4. 628 Chaturvedi, Muskaan
  5. 459 Chen, Eric
  6. 300 Chen, Matthew
  7. 204 Dhawan, Isha
  8. 999 Dongre, Ruchika
  9. 162 Gangu, Swetha
  10. 628 Ginjupalli, Mahija
  11. 301 Gunda, Indhusri
  12. 742 Guo, Alicia
  13. 629 Guo, Stephanie
  14. 000 Hohl, Brenner
  15. 830 Huang, Jason
  16. 160 Liang, Drake
  17. 628 Ram, Keshav
  18. 790 Roberts, Elizabeth
  19. 999 Wang, Brandon
  20. 201 Wang, Faye
  21. 870 Wang, Nicole
  22. 303 Wang, Warren
  23. 600 Xu, Andrew
  24. 204 Yan, Rena
  25. 628 Yan, Sally
  26. 999 Zhang, Jenny
  27. 628 Zhang, Michael
  28. 300 Zheng, Stephen
  29. 999 Zhou, Erika
  30. 160 Zhu, Joy
  31. 303 Zhu, Michelle

THE WOODLANDS COLLEGE PARK H. S. (-2 vs 2017)

  1. 200 Barron, Randall L.
  2. 628 Cao, David W.
  3. 000 Davis, Jacob A.
  4. 450 Du, Stephanie Y.
  5. 209 Harras, Josephine C.
  6. 836 Hatch, Christopher M.
  7. 830 Imhoff, Eric D.
  8. 455 Le, Isabella C.
  9. 160 Li, Lilia
  10. 303 Lowe, Jonathon M.
  11. 162 Packer, Samuel A.
  12. 160 Rahman, Sreya S.
  13. 160 Ramchandran, Sanjana
  14. 303 Rees, Shane A.
  15. 209 Sajit, Vishnu K.
  16. 185 Schnicer, Indiana
  17. 301 Soares, Oluwatobi D.
  18. 600 Yuan, Mingyang

THE WOODLANDS H. S. (-5 vs 2017)

  1. 170 Cottrell, Victoria I.
  2. 628 Kessinger, Kenneth R.
  3. 459 Lee, Evan D.
  4. 300 Poon, Clark A.
  5. 955 Powers, Conor G.

Click here for the full press release from National Merit.

This article was originally published on ThesisMag.com and written by Shelby Joe.

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  • Sara Fetahagic

    Sara holds a BA in English and Linguistics from The University of Texas at Austin. A native Houstonian, she began writing for General Academic in 2021.

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