03/25/2006
High School holds National History Day contest
By: Jessica Selby

One giant scrapbook tells the story of Uncle Tom's Cabin. A six-foot poster board reveals the hidden secrets that brought down Al Capone and his illegal alcohol empire. And a 9 minute and 58 second documentary featuring Mike Eruzione, captain of the 1980 Olympic Hockey Team, shares the story of the boycott of the 1980 Olympic Games.

For this years National History Day projects, history teachers at Coventry High School asked their students to pick a person or topic and tell how their subject represented "Taking a Stand in History."

Shori DeGraide, a tenth grade student at CHS, created the scrapbook Victoria Lomas, also a tenth grader, came up with and developed the idea for the uncovering of Al Capone's antics and Kristen Sousa, Emily Whittaker, Nicole Wilson and Erin Silva, all tenth graders, made the documentary.

The National History Day contest rule book provided guidelines for the students to follow but they were given leeway as to the structure of their project.
"Entries must be clearly related to the annual theme and explain your topics significance in history," the rule book reads. No restrictions on periods of time or topics exist anywhere in the rule book. Restrictions are placed on other criteria such as how the project should be displayed, how many words can be used and what can be included in the display.

Mary Barden, a senior at CHS who has made it to the national level of the National History Day competition twice, helped with the judging this year.
"The rules are sometimes challenging to follow," Barden said. "They give you a lot of freedom to come up with your idea but place restrictions on how to develop it."
"You are basically supposed to get your point across visually like a museum exhibit," she said. "You don't see too many museum exhibits bogged down with written essays do you?"

DeGraide, who created the oversized scrapbook which stood 2 feet tall by 2 feet wide, came close to the maximum word limit.
"DeGraide was close, but she fit into the requirements just fine because the quotes and the other copied texts that the students use is not included in the 500 word max," Matthew Brissette, the chair of the Social Studies Department at CHS and one of the school judges said. "It is their own words that the students are restricted to 500 words."

Inside the pages of the scrapbook, made of plywood and covered with a woven tablecloth, are some of DeGraide's own words regarding her topic as well as a collection of historic pictures, copies of Harriet Breacher Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin" manuscripts and a timeline of occurrences surrounding the events of Harriet Beacher Stowe's life.
"Harriet Beacher Stowe was a catalyst toward the emancipation of the slaves and the Civil War so I thought she would be a great idea for the theme of this year's National History Day project," said DeGraide. "And since it's about a book, I thought I would do it up big and make my poster board out of an oversized book."
DeGraide also incorporated other props into her display including a set of gigantic eye glasses and material such as an assortment of newspaper clippings and other stray photos.

Julie O'Connell, Kaitlyn Bouchard and Samantha Corrigan, all tenth graders, did their project on Rebecca Nurse, a victim of the Salem Witch Trials. The girls included pictures of O'Connell visiting the Rebecca Nurse homestead in Danvers, Mass., of Nurse's trial and copies of the petitions to oppose her hanging on their six-foot tall poster board.

"She was one of the only women to refuse to say she was guilty of being a witch, so she was eventually hung by the hierarchy because of their paranoia," O'Connell said.
Kevin Gravier, a tenth grader, was the creator of "Standing Alone, the Fight to Save St. Paul's Cathedral." included a toy-sized model of the White House, pictures captured inside of black rimmed picture frames and a compact disk playing the words of Winston Churchill.

"Including sound into the project is another really good way to bring the judges attention toward a project," Barden said. "It makes it more interesting and stand out against the rest. The picture frames make for a better presentation, too."

Participation in the National History Day project is geared primarily toward tenth and eleventh grade students at the high school level, Brissette said. Social studies teachers are given the option to have their student's participate or not. This year over 500 students participated. Those teachers who choose not to have their student's participate can either assign a research paper or develop an alternative assessment that mirrors a research project or a national history day project, Brissette said.

"It was great to see so many students participate this year," said Brissette. "Student's with many diverse academic backgrounds participated and turned out quality projects."
Ninth grade students are given annotated bibliographies as assignments to help prepare them for the major undertaking for the following year, he said.
This was the first year that the contest was opened up to students in the middle schools in Coventry. The hope, according to Brissette, is to make those students aware of the expectations on them for this event at the high school level.

History Day is now part of the sixth through eleventh grade curriculum in the Coventry School district.
At the close of the student competition at the high school, first place for individual exhibit went to Robert DiChristoforo for "Mr. Gorbachev Tear Down This Wall" and second place went to Anna Barden for "Arthur Ashe."

First place for group exhibit went to Alexandra Hollenback and Alyssa Peckham for Margaret Sanger. Second place went to Britney Pond and Sara Constantineau for the Dorr Rebellion.

First place in the category of group documentary went to Emily Whittaker, Kristen Sousa, Erin Silva and Nicole Wilson for "More Than a Medal - Standing Up For a Cause at the Olympics." Second place went to Aseel Eid, Samantha Andrea and Steve Alden for their documentary entitled "Standing Up to be Knocked Down: Antoinette Downing's Effect on Rhode Island Preservation."

First place in the category of Individual Performance went to Lindsey Paiva for "Make Love Not War; A musical interpretation of the effects of protest songs on the Vietnam War." Second place went to Matthew Guertin for "Beethoven: Standing Up For Music."

Kristyn Golomb was recognized for her research paper on "Maya Angelou; Taking a Stand against Stereotypes."
The winners of the school-based competition will go to the state level contest at Providence College on April 29. Anyone who secures a win there will move on to the national competition held in Washington, D.C., in June.