Duluth Students to Compete in Minnesota History Day Event

DULUTH, Minn. -Some Duluth East students will be headed to the Minnesota State History Day competition next Saturday in Minneapolis. Students from Denfeld, Stella Maris Academy, and Junior High Schools have also qualified for the state competition.

The theme of this year’s History Day is ‘Turning Points in History.’ Some of the topics students from Duluth East will be presenting include A&M Records vs. Napster, the first woman to run the Boston Marathon, and the Development of Criminal Profiling.

“They can choose their own topic, they can also choose how they want to compete, from documentary, to paper, to exhibit board, to website, to performance,” said Catherine Nachbar, a history teacher at Duluth East. “So that part adds a whole other layer of not only what is the topic, and how can I align that topic to the theme, but also how am I going to present basically putting their topic aligned with the theme into context for that historical event. And, that takes a lot of skill. And, they learn a lot”.

Garin Heckbert is not in this year’s competition. Last year as a junior he and his partner did so well at the Minnesota competition that the two went on to the National History Day and finished fourth in the nation. This year he is volunteering at the Minnesota event. Heckbert said he’s learned a great by competing.

“I think the research knowledge, I think, is the biggest thing, where every time I have a school project after having done History Day for like five years, and they’re like, You need to have two sources,” said Heckbert. ”It seems kind of rote, it seems really easy. Because we used to have like 54 for History Day.”

Next Saturday for the competition, upward of 800 students from across the state will be gathering for the Minnesota State History day. The day is sponsored by the Minnesota Historical Society.