Many De Soto High School students and staff members have a variety of talents and hobbies, ranging from making long boards to bird calling. It’s time to shed some light on some of these talented individuals and what they do in their free time.

Junior Kate Contreras is one of the many talented students who attend DHS. She has three different black belts in martial arts; one for general martial arts, one for weapons usage and the third is for judo.

Contreras began practicing taekwondo in fourth grade. With encouragement from her mother, Contreras became involved in the sport after being inspired by a movie starring Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee.

“My mother thought when you get older and life gets more dangerous, why not teach you protection,” Contreras said.

After studying at American Sport Karate Center for about four years, Contreras stopped attending and started practicing mainly at home. Her favorite parts about martial art are sparring, belt testing and breaking boards.

Last year senior Ramsey Heer joined the ranks of the talented students at DHS when he learned how to play two saxophones simultaneously.

“We were just messing around one day and I took my [baritone saxophone] and my tenor [saxophone] and played them together at the same time,” Heer said.

Students aren’t the only talented part of DHS. Several members of the staff have a few tricks up their sleeves, including paraprofessional Kris Swearingen’s talent of professional West Coast Swing dancing.

“I’ve always liked dancing,” Swearingen said. “My senior year, I was in our musical, West Side Story, and our choreographer owned a ballroom studio and every Saturday night he had an East Coast Swing night, which is more of your typical swing. I started going to that, and I fell immediately in love with it and met some friends who introduced me to west coast shortly after that and I’ve been doing that intensely ever since.”

Swearingen is a member of the Kansas City Swing Core which puts on monthly and weekly dances and has competed all over the country.

“I was just in Tampa Bay last weekend,” Swearingen said. “I’m in D.C. this weekend, Chicago a couple weeks ago.”

Over Thanksgiving break, Swearingen will be competing in the U.S. Open Swing Dance Championships, a worldwide competition in Burbank, Calif. Swearingen has already won various titles. He is the current All-Star Classic Champion and he is ranked No. one in the world in his division. He has had multiple top-three placements throughout the year and he was a U.S. Open Finalist.

“One of my favorite memories is the All-Star Classic Championships. When we won, we got perfect scores through all the judges and we got the largest standing ovation of the entire weekend after we performed,” Swearingen said.

There are many students and staff at DHS with hidden talents. It’s not every day that these talents are recognized as much as they should be. Ranging from martial arts to musical flair to competitive swing dancing; everyone at DHS has something that they exceed at.