By Lindsay Newfeld

Thirty-five new juniors were inducted into Tempe Prep’s chapter of National Honor Society on Feb. 23. The officers of NHS spoke about the four pillars of the Society: character, service, leadership, and scholarship. The keynote speaker, Mrs. Janine Skinner, spoke about her role in founding a branch of Feed My Starving Children right here in Mesa. And the Society presented Mr. Veenstra with its NHS Teacher of the Year Award. This award is presented to a teacher every year that the members of NHS deem worthy of recognition for their outstanding teaching abilities and contributions to the community of the school.

National Honor Society continues to be one of the largest clubs on campus and the reasons for that came to light at our induction ceremony. While each new member was being inducted a slideshow was playing in the background with the student’s service hours and the organizations they volunteer at. These students have volunteered at hundreds of different organizations and have put just as many hours into service work for the community.

All high school students at Tempe Prep are required to complete at least ten community service hours each year in order to graduate. But the students in NHS continually go above and beyond that number because they do not serve simply because it is required but because they want to help their communities and the people in them.

Tempe Prep has had a long-standing relationship with Feed My Starving Children. This partnership began in 2011 and since then students at TPA, but specifically NHS, have put well over their fair share of time and effort into the organization. Since 2011, we have attended over 60 packing sessions and packaged enough food to feed almost 70 children for an entire year. These numbers come from an extremely small school with an extremely small student body but we have produced them because our students are dedicated and passionate about service.

As the school year reaches its last quarter, new officers from the junior class are soon going to be elected to serve NHS and next year we will welcome a new crop of students into the society. This club would not be the success it is without Mrs. Moffitt or its student leaders but most importantly it would not be a success without its devoted, upright members.