Birchwood had a wonderful showing at the state level of the National History Day competition. Held at the brand new Ohio State University student union building in Columbus, 22 students went with strong projects and high hopes. There were many high quality projects from other schools as well and the competition was tough. Birchwood students excelled in a number of categories and six students are advancing to the national competition which will be held at the University of Maryland in June. In the paper category, both Sam Z and Amir F were national finalists. This is the first time Birchwood has sent on two historical papers to nationals. Sam’s paper is on the Gatling Gun and Amir’s paper is on Garrett Morgan, the Cleveland inventor of the gas mask and traffic light. Also advancing to the national competition is Nathan C with his website on Alan Freed, the innovative Cleveland radio deejay who coined the term “rock and roll.” In the individual documentary category, Ben W will be competing with his documentary on the printing press. Zaeem M and Clare P will be representing Birchwood in the group performance category with their performance on the Marshall Plan. In addition, Amir received two special awards from the Society of Ohio Archivists and the Ohio Historical Records Advisory Board for his use of historical, archival records in his research.
There were also a number of other strong showings by Birchwood students. In the group documentary category, Munim, Zach I, and Deepak K were the national alternates with their project on the polio vaccine. Hassan S was a national alternate in the individual documentary category for his project on the Apple II computer. Making the finals of the state competition and thus receiving honorable mentions were Kavya R for her website on the Bill of Rights, Lulu Sun for her website on the Northwest Ordinance, and Trevor L and Sunny R for their group performance on Yellow Journalism.
Good luck to all at the national competition in June!
