The Trustee Scholarship at Boston University is the school’s most prestigious merit-based award. The scholarship, given to students who demonstrate outstanding academic and leadership abilities, is hard to win but very rewarding: It covers the full cost of undergraduate tuition.

Salem High School’s Kripa Patel, a co-valedictorian of the school’s class of 2009, is a Trustee Scholarship recipient. This fall, she will begin her study of biomedical engineering at the school.

“It’s very exciting,” said Patel, 18, about graduating from SHS on June 12. “I’m going to miss Salem High, definitely, but I’m excited to move on to college.”

While Patel is studying at BU, Nick Letizio, 18, the other co-valedictorian, will be attending Yale University, an Ivy League school in New Haven, Conn.

He plans to major in chemistry or chemical engineering before heading to graduate school for business. He’s thinking about working in pharmaceuticals or a technical field.

The pair reached the top of their class of 540 students while taking some of the school’s hardest classes.

Despite taking advanced placement and honors courses, neither earned less than an A minus – and those were very rare – on their report cards.

“I think for me it’s a lot of self motivation,” said Patel, who lives in Salem. “My parents like to see me get good grades, but they’re not really the pushy kind because they know I care. So they let me do my own thing. So I think it’s my own motivation, and we’ve had a lot of great teachers at Salem High.”

Letizio, a Windham resident, credits self motivation and parents who wanted him to put in his best effort in school for his academic success.

“I always tried to put my best foot forward and tried as hard as I could,” said Letizio. “Then I discovered I’m very type A, very competitive. I don’t like to accept failures. I tried to put myself in a position, as often as I could, to do well in whatever I was doing. It feels good to get good grades, but it’s really more the intrinsic motivation of doing well in a subject and feeling you really understand the concepts and you’re getting the mastery of knowledge that you know will help you later on.”

Both students worked hard and stayed up late some nights doing school work. Letizio said balancing academics with sports and extracurricular activities was a challenge.

Patel admits to pulling a few “all-nighters” – working through the night without sleep – followed by school and track practice.

Patel was attracted to BU for the fine reputation of its biomedical engineering program.

Last summer, she attended Curie Academy at Cornell University, a week-long program for high school girls interested in engineering.

“I could see doing (engineering) the rest of my life,” she said.

A three season runner – she competed in cross country and indoor and outdoor track – Patel also serves as president of National Honor Society, and has been active in Key Club and in the science and tutoring clubs.

She participated in a weekly after-school internship as part of Women in Technology at BAE Systems, and outside of school is a member of Swadhyay, an Indian cultural organization.

Letizio is a member of National Honor Society and the math team, president of the Band Council, has been active in jazz band and winter percussion, and competes in tennis. He’s an Eagle Scout, was a New Hampshire Boys State delegate, and volunteers in his community.

When Letizio signed up to take Chemistry I his junior year, he didn’t think he would like the subject. But teacher Mark Hillner turned him onto the subject and Letizio decided to take AP chemistry his senior year.

“I really ended up enjoying it and wanted to go on,” said Letizio who studied a Chemistry II textbook over the summer at home to prepare for the AP course. “He’s really good at showing people the exciting part of science.”

Like Patel, Letizio will speak at the graduation ceremony before an audience of classmates, and their friends and families.

“It’s really exciting to have a reward for all the effort you put in,” he said. “In the end … to have that honor, it’s really a huge honor. I’m very happy.”