By NEAL WAGNER / City Editor

Three Evangel Classical Christian School students recently were named among the top students in the nation who took the Preliminary SAT test, and two of them are working to earn a portion of more than $35 million in college scholarships in the spring.

ECCS seniors Dru Bell, Sydney Marvin and Tyler Russell joined their ECCS classmates in taking the PSAT in October 2012, and the three recently learned they earned some of the top scores in the nation.

The PSAT is sponsored by the College Board and the National Merit Scholarship Corporation, and is a preparation test for the SAT college admissions test. The PSAT is a timed test consisting of five sections featuring more than 125 questions.

Of the more than 1.5 million college-bound juniors nationwide who took the PSAT in October 2012, Russell and Bell were named National Merit semifinalists for scoring in the top 16,000 students.

Marvin was named a Commended Scholar for scoring in the top 50,000 of the 1.5 million who took the test in October 2012.

As a result of being named National Merit semifinalists, Bell and Russell are now in the running for a portion of more than $35 million in National Merit scholarships. The two ECCS students have submitted applications including their academic records, list of school involvement and community service activities, school leadership involvement, lists of honors and awards, an essay and recommendation letters from teachers. The National Merit finalists and scholarship winners will be announced in the spring of 2014.

The students also took the SAT test to confirm their PSAT scores.

ECCS Principal Melissa Bell said the school’s class of 2014 contains only 20 students, meaning about one-seventh of the class earned PSAT awards.