Renaissance Academy Middle School Historians Advance to State Competition

West Chester, PA --- On Saturday, March 21, 2015, six Renaissance Academy 8th grade students competed in the 26th annual Southeast Regional National History Day competition held at the Chester County Historical Society, West Chester, PA. These bright students included Jeffrey Cocci, Siddarth Srinivasan, AJ Bragoli, Luke Poltorak, Rose Newmiller, and Maddie Mullaney.

The Southeast Regional National History Day competition brings hundreds of student scholars in grades 6 through 12 to the historical society, where students present their original research to judges and receive feedback about their use of primary source research to argue their thesis. Judging occurs based on a selected them in each of five categories, Performance, Documentary, Exhibit, Historical Paper, and Web Site. The theme for the 2015 competition is “Leadership and Legacy in History”.

Winning first place in the Individual Paper category, Maddie Mullaney will be joined by third place winner, Rose Newmiller, in moving on the state competition which will held on May 12th and 13th at Millersville University, Millersville, PA.

The first and second award winners in each of the five categories from state competition will then advance to The Kenneth E. Behring National History Day competition, named for Mr. Behring in recognition of his support of National History Day (NHD). This week-long event will be held in June at the University of Maryland, College Park, MD.

About this event, Renaissance Academy social science teacher, Brian Tell said, “I’m proud of each of these students for all of the hard work they put into researching and writing their papers throughout the year. This was an assignment that began in October and just finally finished up in February. Entering into the Regional Contest was an option I gave to all of my 8th grade students and this group of students expressed interest from the start. They represented Renaissance very well at Regionals and I am excited for Maddie and Rose to have the opportunity to complete with the best and brightest in the state for a chance to move to nationals. They are both excellent students and I know they will give nothing but their best effort.”

Established in 1999, the Renaissance Academy Charter School is a fully accredited K-12, award-winning, tuition-free, college prep charter school located in Phoenixville, PA. Renaissance Academy was recently listed as the #1 K-12 charter school on the 2013-2014 Pennsylvania School Performance Profile published by the Pennsylvania Department of Education. For more information on the school, please visit www.rak12.org.
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