Nashua-Plainfield kids do great at National History Day contest

By Bob Fenske, Nashua Reporter

Little Nashua-Plainfield had itself a big day last Thursday.

Long a state power in the National History Day contest, Nashua-Plainfield claimed medals at the national level for the first time ever as Morgan Kapping finished third with her individual exhibit and the quartet of Caleb Lines, Abby Poppe, Faith Carpenter and Jayne Levi did the same in the group website contest.

Only 54 projects out of 1,800 to 1,900 at the national event receive medals, said Suzy Turner, Nashua-Plainfield History Day advisor.

“I mean, seriously, think about that percentage,” Turner said. “That, to me, puts it in perspective. It’s crazy. To bring home two medals, it shows you what kind of kids we have.”

Many of the medalists come from schools that have enrollments as large as the entire population of the city of Nashua, but Levi spoke for her teammates when she said being from a school the size of Nashua-Plainfield is an advantage.

“You know, if we were really big, we probably wouldn’t have as much 1-on-1 time with Mrs. Turner,” she said. “I don’t think of it as a disadvantage; I think coming from a small school actually helps us.”

The five medalists were part of a school-record 11 students who took part in the national contest that was held on the University of Maryland campus in Landover, which is a suburb of Washington, D.C.

They arrived on Saturday, registered and took part in the opening ceremonies on Sunday, prepped Monday and then competed Tuesday.

National History Day has several divisions — paper, performance, exhibit, documentary and website — and all but the paper can either be done by a group or an individual.

Each project is placed in a “room” with 10 or 11 other projects and only the first-place finisher advances to the finals.

The finals are on Wednesday, but except for a couple of the categories, the finalists aren’t announced until the Thursday awards ceremony when the top three — the medalists — are also announced.

“I was really anxious,” said Kapping, whose project was titled “The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory: Fiery Conflict Sparks Compromise” and who also finished fourth in the same division a year ago. “It being my last year, and being so close to medaling last year … I kept telling myself this year my main goal was to make nationals, go out there with my friends, but I was super anxious.”

And when she learned that she had earned the third-place medal?

“I cried,” she said. “I mean I really cried. Of course, everyone knew I was going to cry because that’s me being me, but I know I’m an extremely competitive and as cool as it was last year, it was disappointing to come that close to a medal and not get one.”

Meanwhile, her friends had to wait for a couple more hours to learn the fate of their group website titled “The Iran Hostage Crisis: 444 Days of Diplomatic Failure.”

“At first, I was really nervous,” Poppe said with a laugh, “and then I was bored and then I was super nervous again.”

But finally the time arrived, and the four students were announced as the winners of the third-place medal.

“I’m not going to lie, I think we all went a little nuts, especially after what we had to go through this year,” Lines said.

At March’s district contest, the quartet did not finish in the top two, and it appeared their season was over. Turner was, in a word, stunned.

“We’ve sent group websites to nationals and this was right up there with those,” she said. “I just struggled with it.”

She appealed the judge’s decision to state officials, who granted the group an invitation to the state contest because of “judging irregularities.”

“Yeah, it does feel a little like redemption,” Carpenter said. “We had put so much time into it, and then to have someone say they didn’t think we had enough research into it, we were kind of like, ‘What just happened?’ But it all worked out.”

And in many ways, the same could be said for Nashua-Plainfield’s other national qualifiers — Thomas Lindloff, Lucas Pierce and Isaac Swaney in group documentary; Drew Moine in individual documenter; Tanner Striegel in individual performance; and Sammi Tolnai in individual website.

Like Carpenter, Poppe and Levi, they are all underclassmen, which means they have another shot next year.

“I think the experience of being there does help,” Turner said. “I know when we were in the airport Thursday, they were already talking about project ideas for next year.”

For graduates Kapping and Lines, last week’s contest was an end, but they said they will always be grateful they were part of an extracurricular activity that literally took hundreds of hours of their time and involved what seemed like endless research.

“Academically, it really allowed me to learn how to research properly,” Kapping said. “We joke all the time about Turner’s obsession with bibliographies, but I know this is going to help me in college.

“But it’s more than that, it’s a chance to meet and talk to people you normally don’t see, make friends you would have never made and yes, I’m even going to miss the stress, which sounds crazy,” she said.

Lines was asked if he would miss History Day.

“Absolutely, it’s been — and yes, I know for some people this sounds weird — so much fun,” he said. “I’ve learned a lot, but what makes it what it is to me is being in Turner’s room and watching everyone freak out at some time or another.

“We joke around so much sometimes it’s hard to believe we get any work done,” Lines said, “but I’ll tell you right now I wouldn’t trade History Day for anything.”