Hard Work Pays Off

12 students have qualified to attend National History Day, including Bryant Gregoire, Manaswini Koduru, Daniel Ginzburg, Jack Savenko, Hayden Hedstrom, Akul Chamesh, Prajeet Akula, Krishika Gosai, Penelope Houser, Charlie Stones, Caroline Thompson, and Aubrey Taylor. They will be representing WRMS this summer in Washington, D.C., with Ava Khulmann as an alternate. History Day is a competition in which students choose a topic and dive deep into the past, by organizing broad research in libraries, museums, and archives. They then present their conclusions and evidence through papers, exhibits, performances, documentaries, or websites, moving through a series of levels where they are assessed by professional historians and educators. Regional History Day was hosted at Washburn University on Saturday, February 22 at Washburn University, and State History Day was on Saturday, April 20, hosted at Seaman Middle School.

Mrs. Dowell, WRMS gifted facilitator, has many things that excite her about History Day. “One of the best things is getting to interview and know people who have experienced the events the students are researching,” said Dowell. Since every project is different, at times it was challenging for Dowell to organize and help students. ”Unlike in a classroom where everyone is studying the same topic, each student is researching a different part of history.” Students chose their topics and started researching back in September. “The contest is called ‘History Day,’ but it is more like ‘History Year’,” said Dowell.

Daniel Ginzburg and Jack Savenko, 2nd place junior group exhibit winners, won the Bob Dole award from the Bob Dole museum, in which they collectively won $150. They spent a lot of time trying to make their project so that everyone else would like it as much as they did. “There was a lot of work at home, so trying to work with sports and stuff got a little tough,” said Savenko. Although they were excited that they qualified, they were upset that they got second place. 

Hayden Hedstrom, one of the twelve qualifiers, is very excited to get to go to National History Day. “I was just super happy because my best friend made it too and I was just shaking really bad,” said Hedstrom. Many students agreed that the hardest part of this project was creating their bibliography. “It was just so long and it took forever. We have to do an annotated bibliography, so we had to write two sentences per source,” said Hedstrom, “This project is ongoing. We have to research until we go to D.C..”

The 12 students will be going to D.C. from June 9-13. They will compete on Tuesday, June 11, and there will be an awards ceremony on Thursday, June 13.