KHS Hosts Successful NHDKY State Contest

On April 26, the 2025 National History Day in Kentucky (NHDKY) State Contest returned to the Kentucky Historical Society’s campus, and 154 students, representing 28 schools, submitted 98 projects for consideration. Twenty-three volunteer judges evaluated documentaries, exhibits, papers, performances, and websites.

 

National History Day in Kentucky is a project-based learning experience where students create and compete with a project relating to a topic of their choice in one of five categories: documentaries, exhibits, papers, performances, and websites. This year, students worked individually or in small groups to connect their projects to the NHD annual theme, “Rights and Responsibilities in History.” At regional contests, volunteer judges recruited from museums, universities, schools, and the local community evaluated the projects for qualities such as historical accuracy, sources used, multiple perspectives analyzed, and relevance to the annual theme. The top 1/3 of projects in each category advanced to the NHDKY State Contest. 

 

KHS partnered with six organizations from across the Commonwealth to offer thematic Special Awards, and these were recognized during the awards ceremony, held at the Capital Plaza Hotel. They included the following:

Forty-six students, representing 29 projects, will advance to National History Day's National Contest, June 8-12, 2025, in College Park, Maryland. The National Contest welcomes NHD delegations from across the United States and internationally. 

 

 

• Senior Division First Place: Lacey Stewart – Individual Exhibit – “Valaida Snow: A Trumpeting Presence in the Entertainment Industry”
• Senior Division Runner Up: Aiden Song, Aws Yousef, Vivaan Bhaskar, and Harshan Karthik – Group Documentary – “Rights of Man Vs Responsibility of the U.S. Government: The Story of the Tuskegee Airmen”
• Junior Division First Place: Whitney Nguyen – Individual Website – “Thurgood Marshall: The Guardian of the 14th Amendment”
• Junior Division Runner Up: Hailey Carey, Ava Gunning, and Reagan James – Group Exhibit – “How Mamie Till Took Responsibility to Make Her Only Son’s Death Unforgettable”

• Senior Division Winner: Jack Gill – Individual Documentary – “The Butt Stops Here: Redefining Smoking Rights in the Heart of Tobacco Country”
• Elementary/Junior Division Winner: Jalyn Slusher -- Individual Performance – “The Harlan County War - A tale of the coal miner's fight in Bloody Harlan”

• Senior Division Winner: Madison Campbell – Paper – “A Terrible Tradition: FGM in Egypt”
• Junior Division Winner: Charlotte Dutschke, Chloe Cobb, & Grace Lay – Group Exhibit – “Rights We Take for Granted: Rebecca Nurse”

• Senior Division Winner: Aiden Song, Aws Yousef, Vivaan Bhaskar, and Harshan Karthik – Group Documentary – “Rights of Man Vs Responsibility of the U.S. Government : The Story of the Tuskegee Airmen”
• Elementary/Junior Division Winner: Reese James – Individual Exhibit – “Anna Smith Strong and Her Husband's Roles in Helping America”

• Winner: Meredith Warren – Junior Exhibit – “Florence Nightingale: Highlighting the Rights and Responsibilities Involved in a Safe and Sanitary Hospital Stay”
• Winner: Leah Yeary and Kharis Johnson – Junior Group Exhibit – “Black Sunday, The Dust Bowl”

• Senior Division Winner: Avery Heffernan – Individual Exhibit – “Lowell Strike of 1836”
• Elementary/Junior Division Winner: Charlotte Dutschke, Grace Lay, and Chloe Cobb – “Rights We Take for Granted: Rebecca Nurse”

Category Awards

• First Place: Annslee Bennett, Abigail Teaney, and Kassidy Starrett – “Title Ix Equal Rules 4 All”

Elementary Group Performance

• First Place: Jordan Miracle, Brody Sanders, and Parker Lasley – “The Story of Hensley Settlement”

Elementary Individual Exhibit 

• First Place: Harper Stewart – “One Seat, One Movement”
• Second Place: Meredith Warren – “Florence Nightingale: Highlighting the Rights and Responsibilities Involved in a Safe and Sanitary Hospital Stay”

• First Place: Clark Smith – “Onward to Freedom: The Robert Smalls Story”

Junior Group Documentary

• First Place: Arden Lin and Lucy Thompson – “The Lobotomy Era: Ethics, Rights, and Responsibility in Medicine”
• Second Place: Joanne Joseph, Nola Barker, and Kalayiah Gordon – “Not All Citizens: African-American Blood in Women's Suffrage”
• Third Place: Cooper Epley, Bo Hoskins, and Alex Partin – “Roy Wilkins: The Voice of a Nation”

Junior Group Exhibit

• First Place: Sarah Haney and McKenna Menold – “Banned Books Week: The Right to Free Speech and the Responsibility to Protect It”
• Second Place: Leah Yeary and Kharis Johnson – “Black Sunday, The Dust Bowl”
• Third Place: Annelise Prodent – “Triangle Shirtwaist Fire: Rights and Responsibilities for Workers”

Junior Group Performance

• First Place: Allie Lasley, Harley Hensley, and Mckenna Mosley – “African American Women”

Junior Group Website

• First Place: Maddox Evans, Brody Brown, Zakariah Ewing – “Plessy v. Ferguson: Ignoring the Responsibility to Protect Rights”
• Second Place: Mia McCullough and Ava Partin – “Ruby Bridges”
• Third Place: Ayden Aguilar, Timothy Hollifield, Jordan Nguyen, and Jayden Le – “Birmingham Campaign: Rights and Responsibilities”

• First Place (Tie): Sally Yu – “Her Right, Her Responsibility, and the Lie: Margaret Keane”
• First Place (Tie): Annabeth Clarkson – “The Right to Work; The Responsibility to Protect: The Radium Girls of 1917”
• Third Place: Oteamcal Otien – “Montgomery Bus Boycott: A Fight for Justice”

• First Place: Zara Stewart – “They Say in Harlan County: The Battle for Labor Union Rights, Corporate Responsibility, and the Entire Working Class”
• Second Place: Madison Taylor – “The Holocaust: Persecution and Genocide”
• Third Place: Willow Lowe-Hoelmer – “The United State government's responsibility to the Cherokee Nation”

• First Place: Jalyn Slusher – “The Harlan County War”
• Second Place: William Burress – “Injustice”

• First Place: Whitney Nguyen – “Thurgood Marshall: The Guardian of the 14th Amendment”
• Second Place: Nate Weiger – “Right to Keep and Bear Arms”
• Third Place: Charlton Zhuang – “The Pentagon Papers: The Right to Know vs. Government Secrecy”

• First Place: Liam Kellie – “Rights and Responsibilities During the Prohibition”
• Second Place: Jake Lyons – “The Engineer Frontier: Rights and Responsibilities of the Corps of Engineers”
• Third Place: Seth Woods – “Rights and Responsibilities During the Vietnam War”

• First Place: Aiden Song, Aws Yousef, Vivaan Bhaskar, and Harshan Karthik – “Rights of Man Vs Responsibility of the U.S. Government : The Story of the Tuskegee Airmen”

• First Place: Payton Elliott, Paisleigh Wilson, Kinley Miracle – “Our Right, Kentucky's Responsibility: KERA”
• Second Place: Landyn Hollimon and Jonathan Payne – “A Nation's Shame: The Incarceration of Japanese Americans During World War II”

Senior Group Website

• First Place: Akshay Bassetti Nayakwadi and Saikrish Kolli – “A Promise Made, A Trust Betrayed: The Failed Rights and Responsibilities of the Budapest Memorandum”

Senior Individual Documentary

• First Place: Jack Gill – “The Butt Stops Here: Redefining Smoking Rights in the Heart of Tobacco Country”
• Second Place: Aryav Shigaonkar – “The Nuremberg Trials: A Defining Fight for Rights and Responsibilities”
• Third Place: Audriana Partin – “Mankiller (Asgaya-dihi): How Wilma Mankiller Changed the View of Native Women”

Senior Individual Exhibit

• First Place: Avery Heffernan – “Lowell Strike of 1836”
• Second Place: Lacey Stewart – “Valaida Snow: A Trumpeting Presence in the Entertainment Industry”
• Third Place: Nicholas Herrera – “The Chicano Movement: Civil Rights in More Than Black and White”

• First Place: Kinzley Barrett – “Kathrine Switzer: Running Towards Women's Equality”
• Second Place: Caroline Adkins – “‘You've Got to Be Carefully Taught’: How Rodgers and Hammerstein Spotlighted Human Rights”

• First Place: Lily Westerfield – “The Big Bad Black Rectangle: The Right to Free Speech v. The Responsibility of Appropriate Education”
• Second Place: Madison Campbell – “A Terrible Tradition: FGM in Egypt”
• Third Place: Daniel Ratley – “The Legacy of San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez: Education Rights, Responsibilities, Resources, and Remedies”