The National Honor Society has been up to a lot this year. Recently, the NHS were at the Lion’s banquet that was held on Monday, April 13 at 6:30 p.m. in the Owatonna High School Cafeteria in the lower commons. The Lion’s banquet was a dinner for the current NHS members. The Lion’s Club then spoke about the involvement, activities and community work of each individual member of NHS as they received a certificate for their participation. NHS member Kathryn DuFrene put together a slideshow which recapped the events that the NHS took a part of over the years. At the Lion’s banquet the Lion’s club was also giving away a NHS Lion’s Scholarship to two lucky NHS members. The two awarded members were Jordan Kubista and Katelyn Rypka. It was a great day for all of the NHS members to be appreciated for all of the hard work they have done.

Shortly after the Lion’s banquet, there will be an induction ceremony on Monday, April 27. There, NHS will be passing on their torch to the NHS class of 2016. DuFrene said, “I’m excited to let another group take our place and continue the tradition of NHS. I’ve had my time as a senior and now the upcoming senior class can enjoy the same experiences that I had.” The induction ceremony is for the current juniors who have been accepted into NHS. Also at the induction ceremony officers for the upcoming NHS class will be announced and members of the community whom the current NHS class has selected to honor for their impact they have left in the community will be announced as the NHS’s monthly honorees.

Each year juniors with a GPA of 3.5 or above receive an application letter in the mail during the second semester of their junior year. When they finish their application, it is then sent to a committee of other teachers around the school. From then on the teachers read over all of the applications and vote yes or no on the entrance of each applicant into NHS. A majority vote decides whether or not each student gets into NHS, and there is no member limit for the organization, it is all based on each student’s merit.

NHS has been an important part of Owatonna High School, with the money they raised from the talent show that they gave to the Lets Smile organization and their participation in the community. NHS is a very impactful organization that is always willing to lend a helping hand and become leaders throughout the community. All of the current NHS members this year are going to be leaving OHS soon. Member Hannah Olson said, “I feel really good. We accomplished a lot this year. I know that it kind of felt disorganized at first and we nobody was really sure what we were going to do, but we started some new projects like garden up. It has just been a really good year.” The 2015 NHS class will be wrapping up their community service projects this month. Their last meeting was Thursday, April 23. Let’s give a farewell to this year’s NHS class and welcome next year’s NHS senior class into OHS. Next year’s NHS members will hopefully leave an impact as did the year before them on both the school and the community.