Iowa City High senior Sonali Durham named Presidential Scholar

IOWA CITY - Sonali Durham, 18, who last weekend graduated from Iowa City High School and is headed to Yale University in the fall, is one of three Iowa seniors to be named 2016 U.S. Presidential Scholars.

Only 160 students in the country received the honor. which since 1964 has recognized students who 'have demonstrated outstanding academic achievement, artistic excellence, leadership, citizenship, service, and contribution to school and community”, according to a news release.

A commission appointed by President Barack Obama initially selected more than 5,600 candidates for the honor based on scores on the SAT and ACT exams.

'On the ACT I got a 35 (out of 36),” Durham said. 'I took it once. I figured that was good.”

Durham said she filled out an application for the Presidential Scholars program last fall and found out she was a semifinalist about a month ago. She then had to submit a series of essays, including one describing a favorite teacher. Durham chose to write about her English 10 Honors teacher, Alina Borger-Germann.

'English 10 Honors was an incredible class,” Durham said. 'It demanded a lot and asked us to be independent thinkers, think, write and read really carefully. I liked challenge it presented. And she was a great, nice person.”

Because Durham was selected as a Presidential Scholar, Borger-Germann will receive a personal letter from U.S. Secretary of Education John King. Borger-Germann said she was 'awestruck” that Durham picked her for the honor.

'There are a lot of phenomenal teachers at City High, and I know I'm just one of a huge group of faculty supporting this brilliant young woman,” Borger-Germann wrote in an email. 'She is the quintessential student in every respect. As JRR Tolkien said, ‘the praise of the praiseworthy is above all reward.'”

Durham isn't sure what her major will be at Yale, but she probably won't be following in her parents' academic footsteps.

Instead, Durham, the daughter of University of Iowa communications professors Frank and Meenakshi Gigi Durham, said she'll probably opt for something in the math or science field.

'Academics have always been really important, and they always encouraged me to challenge myself,” Durham said of her parents.

While at City High, Durham played the viola in the orchestra and received all state honors for 2 years. She also was editor of the Little Hawk student newspaper, president of Interact Club, was co-captain of the cross country team, and started a political awareness club.

This summer, she plans to work with a physics professor at the University of Iowa on a first year seminar in Newtonian physics.

Borger-Germann said she is 'fully confident” Durham will be able to achieve whatever she wants.

'I will not be surprised to see her invent a critical vaccine or sit on the Supreme Court or write the next Pulitzer-Prize winning book - she is gifted enough and hardworking enough to go in any of those directions,” she wrote. 'Whatever path she chooses to pursue, she's going to excel, she's going to rise to the top.”