When junior Ellery Deschamps sat with her friends at lunch, she said they discussed starting a de-stress club and how exciting that would be.

“As we were talking more and saying how we are so stressed, we thought ‘oh, let’s put those two together and just start a de-stress club,’” Deschamps said.

Deschamps said the club will be very relaxing and won’t involve any strenuous work.

“It’s just you come there, you bring yourself, you bring energy and a smile and you just get to have fun and de-stress,” Deschamps said.

De-stress club advisor Mr. Nordmark said he thinks the club is important for students because by learning about stress, students can better prepare themselves for the future.

“Stress isn’t going away. (Stress) kind of changes as you move on through your life, so the better you can learn to deal with it the better you can live with it and not (let) it control you,” Nordmark said.

Deschamps said she was surprised by the number of students who attended the club’s first meeting.

“There (were) a lot of great people and it’s a really great way to learn more about yourself and the way that you work and how stress affects you (while) still being with a group of highschoolers.”

Junior Lindsey Prestholdt said she thought the club was enjoyable and helped her de-stress.

“They definitely had great activities for us to do. I really enjoyed how they had us watch a TED talk that gave me new ideas on how to handle stress and gave me a new point of view on my stress,” Prestholdt said.

Norkmark said the students were attentive and open about sharing what stresses them out and how they cope with that stress.

“I think just based on the number of people that were there it helped (students to) see ‘oh I’m not the only person that feel stressed’ and I think just seeing the numbers was pretty powerful and we talked about ways to work on stress that are not obvious,” Nordmark said. “So maybe you are about to take a test and do something to calm your breathing and focus your mind a little big.”

Prestholdt said the club brings students together and helps them understand how other students feel and deal with stress.

“I think most students at SLP high school are very stressed out and stress can be very detrimental to people’s health and having a program that allows people to de-stress can really help,” Prestholdt said.

Deschamps said the club’s next meeting will be at 8:00 a.m. March 16 in Mr. Nordmark’s room (C367).