AUBURN - For some Auburn High School students, study halls have become more like nap time.

“We often times find kids sleeping in study halls,” observed student Jenna Geherin. “They sleep with their head on their hands, and when they walk to their next class they have a red spot on their face.”

And now Geherin and 79 of her fellow students - hand-picked by class advisors, coaches and extracurricular supervisors for a program designed to develop and enhance leadership skills - are planning to do something about it.

During a presentation to the Auburn Enlarged City School District Board of Education Tuesday, four student representatives from L.E.A.D. USA, an organization dedicated to teaching young adults leadership skills, spoke about a project for which the Auburn High School program chapter is advocating: the creation of a student lounge.

“Our goal is to stop that spot,” Geherin, 18, of Auburn, said. “In order to stop that spot, we would like to create a room where students can go for study hall. We want to make students come to school and give them an opportunity to have a good time.”

Geherin, Bethany Schroeder, Kevin Anderson and Marissa Slayton spoke to the board about this proposal, one they believe will have a positive impact upon the school's graduation rate.

Last fall, school leaders identified 80 students who exhibit leadership skills, to participate in the program, which provides training to enhance those skills and use them to influence the people around them.

These students meet every Wednesday after school for 40 minutes and participate in a series of workshops and programs - one of which being a field trip to Orenda Springs ropes course in Marcellus for team building - to strengthen these skills.

“The premise of the program is to figure out a way to be significant in the lives of others,” Auburn High School Principal Brian Morgan said. “It is important to do good things for yourself, but the bigger challenge is: Can you make a difference for other people?”

The program is financed by the Stardust Foundation of Central New York, which is also funding the program at the Booker T. Washington Community Center, Champions for Life, the YMCA-WEIU and the high school wrestling team to establish a sustained effort to harvest a population of leaders.

One of the requirements set by the Stardust Foundation, Morgan said, is the completion of a community service project and make the school community a better place.

Research shows that students who drop out of school do so because they don't feel a connection to the learning environment, he said.

“Our drop-out rate is too high. We have a drop-out rate we know we need to improve upon,” he said, adding that there are a number of programs established to curb that rate. “But from a student perspective, they want to know what they can do, and that's the project they decided to work on, to build a better sense of community at the school because that's where we think we can improve upon.”

Anderson, 18, of Auburn, said creating a lounge would come at no cost for the district, as the L.E.A.D. USA group will conduct fundraising and lobby the Stardust Foundation for money.

To get the word around the school, the group made posters, signs and T-shirts, as well as organized a model of the room in the school's front lobby.

“The student lounge can be a place students can get away from the stresses of school,” Anderson said.

Staff writer Alyssa Sunkin can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 239 or alyssa.sunkin@lee.net