Michigan History Day District 1 Competition to be held at Michigan Tech this Saturday

Michigan History Day 2016

The Michigan Technological University Department of Social Sciences and the Michigan Technological University Archives and Copper Country Historical Collections are pleased to announce that the Michigan History Day district 1 competition will be held at the Memorial Union Building at Michigan Tech, Saturday, February 20, 2016 from 9am to 1pm.

Five secondary schools from MI-District 1 (the 6 western counties of the UP) will be sending nearly 100 students with over 40 History Day projects to Michigan Tech for a district competition. Top entries in each category — exhibits, documentaries, websites, papers, and performances — will be eligible to go to State competition in April. Winning entries will also be on display in May at the Carnegie Museum on Houghton.

History Day is a competition for middle and high school students who develop historical research projects based on an annual theme that highlight people, events, and ideas in history.  This year’s national theme is “Exploration, Encounter, Exchange in History” and projects are on local, state, national, and even world history.  Michigan History Day is sponsored and coordinated by the Historical Society of Michigan, which coordinates 13 state districts.  Each school in the district has initial competitions and sends up to three entries (individual or group) in each category to a district competition, which then sends on top projects in each category to state finals in May.

ABOUT MHD-district 1: Assistant Professors Steven Walton and Jonathan Robins, both historians in the Dept. of Social Sciences, and Senior Archivist Lindsay Hiltunen of the Michigan Tech Archives are the coordinators for Michigan District 1 (Houghton, Keweenaw, Baraga, Ontonagan, Iron and Gogebic counties). The Department of Social Sciences offers a B.A. degree in history with particular strength in industrial and environmental history and archaeology.  The Michigan Tech Archives holds unparalleled historical resources on the Copper Country and its mining history. Michigan Tech has been hosting the district conception each February or early March for nearly a decade.

Website: http://www.mtu.edu/social-sciences/undergraduate/history/mhd.html

For more information, contact: Steven Walton, 906-487-3272 (office) or 906-370-3877 (cell) or sawalton@mtu.edu