Lawrence ends the school year with 15 high school graduates who earned prestigious National Merit Scholarships.

Monday, the scholarship’s corporation announced that six more Lawrence students won college-sponsored scholarships.

They are Xander Casad, Stephanie Drahozal and Stephanie Jian of Lawrence High School; Laura Drees and Clara Kundin of Free State High School; and Brooke Sutherland of Bishop Seabury Academy.

Sarah Heschmeyer, a home school student from Eudora, also was named a winner this week.

The college-sponsored awards provide winners between $500 and $2,000 per year for up to four years of undergraduate study at the university financing the scholarship.

Kansas University has awarded the National Merit Harold W. Otto Scholarship to Casad, who plans to study music; Drees for English or psychology; and Jian, who plans to study medicine.

Drahozal, who also scored a perfect 36 composite on her ACT test, earned a scholarship from Washington University in St. Louis. Kundin plans to study theater at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn.

Sutherland’s scholarship comes from Washington and Lee University in Virginia, where she plans to study journalism. Heschmeyer hopes to study nursing, and her award is from the University of Dallas.

Nationally, 8,300 graduates received scholarships worth $36 million. More than 1.4 million juniors took the qualifying test in 2006.

Earlier this year, from Lawrence, three graduates, Justine Ahle, Erin Thimmesch and Martin Blanchard won corporate scholarships. Two other graduates, Cori Allen and Michael Penny, won National Merit $2,500 scholarships, and four others, Mitchell Haverty, Josh Frederick, Maxwell Gregoire and Erika O’Shea also won college-sponsored scholarships.