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E-mail StorySuccess and satisfaction for local students at History Day competition
| Sunday, May 11 2008 2:07 PM
Last Updated: Monday, May 12 2008 7:23 AM
About 40 local students headed home from History Day Sunday and among them were eight first-place winners who will represent California at the nationals in a month’s time.
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But beyond the winning recognition, it’s the experience and the emotion of the event the students will remember long after the accolades have faded.
At least, that’s the message of Fruitvale Junior High coach and former Fruitvale principal, John Hefner.
“It awakens their spirit and the kids become a part of what they’re researching,” said a happy Hefner as he journeyed back from the four-day event just outside of Sacramento.
Take for example the Fruitvale team which took first place in the Group Performance for Juniors category.
The five-member team took on the racially motivated 1963 Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham, Ala., which killed four young, black girls.
The junior high group, comprising Brock Lynch, Dylan Gonzales, Josh Gonzales, Alyssa Shannon and Aaliyah Beed, tracked down a defense attorney and prosecutor from the case and the only living parents of one of the victims, Hefner said.
As if that wasn’t emotional enough, a former Klansman who was in Birmingham at the time of the bombing, traveled to Bakersfield to talk to the students.
“It makes you appreciate history, Dylan Gonzales said. “It make you realize that this had happened and not to let these stories go unnoticed.”
When asked which aspect of the research affected him the most, Dylan didn’t hesitate to respond.
“The hatred that these white men had that led them to bomb this church, that stood out the most to me.”
Fruitvale’s Ana Clegg took first place in Individual Papers for Juniors with a research paper titled, “The 1947 Partition of India,” while Centennial High sophomore Sarah Moore took top honors for her documentary on “The Conflict of Nazis in Skokie.”
Moore was competing in the Individual Documentary for Seniors category.
In the Individual Performance for Juniors section, Fruitvale’s Gabriela Forter studied the United Farm Workers movement with a project titled, “Si, se puede — Yes, we can.”
During her extensive research, Forter, a seventh-grader was invited to lunch by UFW co-founder Dolores Huerta.
“It’s a life-altering experience,” Hefner said. “The kids are changed dramatically.”
Carson Crawford took third place in the Individual Documentary for Juniors category. The Fruitvale student is an alternate for nationals.
Most of the students began researching their subjects in October or November of last year, Hefner said. The nationals will be held June 15-18 at University of Maryland.
About 1,000 students competed in Sacramento, Hefner said.
Hefner retired last year after 30 years in charge at Fruitvale and 30 years of coaching the History Day teams.
“(History Day) was one of the highlights of my career,” Hefner said. “I just couldn’t stay away.”