This weekend, two Eastern Oklahoma County seniors will receive the prestigious 2013 Academic All-State Awards presented by the Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence.

This year, the state’s 100 top public high school senior were selected from 599 nominations statewide. They hail from 80 different schools in 73 Oklahoma school districts, including locally, Choctaw and Jones.

Natalie J. Santa-Pinter is a student at Choctaw High School. She is president of National Honor Society, senior student director for Key Club and past president of Choctaw Leadership Academy for Student Success. She is a National Merit Finalist and was honored as her school’s 2011-12 Outstanding Overall Business Student. A competitive club soccer player and captain of her varsity volleyball team, Santa-Pinter was honored by KFOR Television as a senior athlete of the week. She is active in the St. Teresa of Avila youth group and volunteers for Regional Food Bank and Special Olympics. She plans to major in chemistry at the University of Tulsa.

Jones High School student Sarah Rose Anderson is the second EOC resident to receive the All-State honor this year.

Anderson is a member of National Honor Society and Mu Alpha Theta math honor society as well as four-year, co-captain of the academic team. She is an officer and active member in Key Club, Student Council, Planet Earth Club, Jones against Drugs and Fellowship of Christian Athletes. A two-time Academic All-Conference recipient, she competes in varsity basketball and cross country. Anderson is a volunteer for the Metropolitan Library System’s Come Read with Me program. She plans to study biochemistry at the University of Tulsa.

Each of this year’s All-Staters will receive a $1,000 merit-based scholarship and a medallion. Santa-Pinter’s scholarship sponsor is Tulsa Community College and Anderson’s is the Lobeck Taylor Family Foundation.

The All-Staters will be recognized at the foundation’s 27th annual Academic Awards Banquet on Saturday, May 18, at the Cox Convention Center in Oklahoma City. The featured keynote speaker for the banquet will be Thomas L. Friedman, journalist and Pulitzer Prize-winning author.

David L. Boren, chairman and founder of the Oklahoma Foundation for Excellence, describes the selection of the scholars as "Oklahoma’s most rigorous academic competition." To be nominated for Academic All-State, students must meet one of the following criteria: an ACT composite score of at least 30; a SAT combined critical reading and math score of at least 1340; or be selected as a semi-finalist for a National Merit, National Achievement or National Hispanic Scholarship.

This year’s All-Staters scored an average of 33 on the ACT, with six recipients scoring a perfect 36. In addition, 40 of this year’s All-Staters are National Merit semifinalists.