At the beginning of the school year, the administration collaborated with Student Council and developed three goals for the student body to achieve during the 2019-20 year. One of these goals included academic responsibility. According to Student Council executive Colin Campbell, academic responsibility means being aware of grades and using all resources, including Canvas and Skyward, to do so. With this goal being implemented, a new academic opportunity is now being offered to all students at De Soto High School. 

This convenience, called Study Tables, allows students to have an extra hour to work on homework and get help from other student tutors. Principal Sam Ruff created this idea in hopes of expanding productive time for DHS students to work on homework and other projects. 

“When we [administration] started thinking about how we could provide support to students, one of the things that we hoped was that our students are going to be more academically minded and more academically responsible,” Ruff said. 

National Honor Society is also involved with the creation of Study Tables. With the after-school activity being a place for students to study, NHS is providing the student tutors. For NHS sponsor Lindsey O’Neil, Study Tables has helped to provide the student tutors with volunteer hours. 

“I also think many high school students will benefit from the interaction from our high-achieving NHS students,” O’Neil said. “It’s [Study Tables] a great way for them [NHS members] to get involved with the student body and show their leadership skills at DHS.”

From the perspective of a student tutor, NHS president Delaney Lecluyse thinks the Study Tables are a good way for students to manage their grades. 

“It [Study Tables] gives students a chance to learn from peers and it provides them with a new perspective on the topic,” Lecluyse said. “Not only do they [student tutors] provide extra help on homework, but it’s also a great time to study.” 

Not only are the Study Tables being implemented to instill academic responsibility, but they were also created to increase meaningful time between students and an academic environment. 

“We used to have the credit recovery students work in the same room as students serving detention,” Ruff explained. “We wanted to get away from the potential idea that they [credit recovery students] were also being assigned to a detention.”

With the growth rate of these Study Tables continuing to rise, Ruff plans to administer them for the rest of the year and possibly the following years.

“Students vary their time differently on projects, whether they are assigned to them early on in the year or towards the end, but hopefully students use that time to get to work on and get prepared for those things,” Ruff said. 

Students can attend these Study Tables Monday through Thursday after school in the union from 3 to 4 p.m..