The National Honor Society held their first meeting to go over new rules and plans for the 2014-15 school year on Tuesday, Sept. 23. President Vanessa Zielinski and senior officers Evan Welsh, Allyson Book, John Slaga, Jaxon Baum, and Kenna Roberts worked diligently to get ready for the upcoming year.

“NHS is about service, and leadership, and showing the great ability that you can provide for others,” Zielinski said. “So we thought, lets break up these 170 kids so that they can be involved and so they can know what they can do personally.”

During the meeting, Zielinski and Welsh outlined the year and how it would work. NHS, which is made up of almost 170 juniors and seniors, will split into six smaller groups, each managed by an NHS officer. With this new system, members believe it will help productivity of the club, as well as help make students more involved in the school and the community.

“The members can personally be involved, like they themselves can put their idea out there and help 30 other students do one thing; rather than being 1 in 170, they’re 1 in 30,” Zielinski said. “They can actually work on something together rather than just having the officers say ‘do this, do that,’ they come up with ideas together.”

Each of the student groups will participate in community service events around the district each semester, led by their assigned officer. This way, students will be able to get hours and find community service opportunities in order to complete their necessary hours. NHS sponsor, Leighann Fenter, hopes this new way of organizing the group will make the club run more smoothly.

“We wanted to make the meeting more meaningful and productive,” Fenter said. “We thought that 170 students in the lecture hall wasn’t the best way to do that. Hopefully that will get more involvement in the organization and put NHS out into the community and school.”

Students were assigned to groups at the meeting and will begin attending smaller group meetings in the weeks to come. Though these changes are different from years past, there are high hopes that this new way will make the NHS better than ever.

“I’m really excited about this school year,” Fenter said. “Our officers have done an outstanding job, and I look forward to what all we’re going to accomplish this year.”