First-time National History Day National Contest competitor Kallie Sapp, a Whitehall seventh-grader, delivered impressive results at the June 14-18 contest in College Park, Md., placing second in the nation in Junior Individual Performance.
Sapp's performance was entitled Prologue or Epilogue? How the Chernobyl Nuclear Explosion Revolutionized Modern Radiation Science. Her second-place performance earned Sapp a silver medal and $500 in prize money.
Sapp was one of four Whitehall NHD team members to compete nationally. Izzy Causie, a seventh-year team member and fourth-time national competitor, placed in the top 20 in Senior Individual Website, earning honorable mention and the Senior Division Outstanding Affiliate Award for her website, entitled Buckle Up: The Seat Belt that Revolutionized Automotive Safety Standards. Alexandra Risthouse and Annabelle George also competed from the Whitehall team, teaming up in the Senior Group Exhibit category.
Sapp said she advanced to the runoffs, which determine the final placement in your division, by ranking first among the 10 competitors in her pool. There were 86 total competitors in her Junior Individual Performance category.
While this year marked Sapp's first trip to the NHD national competition, she completed her third year on the Whitehall NHD team. In her first year, she said, she took first place in the youth division at state, but the youth division does not compete in the national event. Last year, Sapp was an alternate for the national competition.
"From the beginning of the year, it was, 'I'm going to go to nationals this year,'" Sapp said. "It was a big year for me. It meant a lot to be at nationals. When I found out I was in the runoffs, that was icing on the cake."
The experience was terrific for Sapp, whose mom Kellie joined her for the week. She was able to stay in the dormitories at the University of Maryland with other competitors from Michigan, and the group practiced their presentations with one another while spending downtime playing card games and board games. The week also included a visit to Washington, D.C. and a tour of the National Mall.
"The entire trip was moving," Sapp said. "There were a lot of great experiences, traveling through D.C., seeing the Flight 93 Memorial, staying in the dorms, meeting people from all over the world, it was really cool. It was an amazing experience."
As for her presentation, which she performed at April's White Lake Area Historical Society meeting along with several of her teammates, Sapp said she made only minor tweaks since April. The presentation saw Sapp play several different characters, including then-KGB Chairman Yuri Andropov, who attempted to alert Soviet authorities about flaws in the facility's construction years ahead of time. With only 10 minutes to perform the entire skit, time management was a big factor in her success.
"I added a little bit about the fall of the Soviet Union and how Chernobyl impacted it," Sapp said. "The judging at the national level, they really like all the varied perspectives of stuff. Because they only give us 10 minutes, it's pretty difficult to throw in all the different perspectives. I think next year, what I'll have to do is cut down on the amount of characters I have and put in the different perspectives via narration points."
NHD coach Jan Klco said that during Sapp's research, she found two key Soviet documents that she used in her performance and interviewed Maria Chmrlarova, a former Czechoslovakian resident, and Bill Kurtis, the first American reporter allowed to visit Chernobyl in 1989, for their personal perspectives.
Sapp has explored topics related to the environment and ecosystems each of her three years in NHD. Her first two topics were plastic pollution and the invention of the plastic bag and, last year, the affect the sturgeon had on Native American cultures. Clearly, the environment is a passion project of Sapp's.
"It started in fifth grade," Sapp said of her interest in the environment. "I don't even remember what it was, but when I did my performance and got to write it, it opened my eyes to what was happening in the world. Because of that, that sprouted the thought that, 'You know what? This is a big problem and a lot more people need to know about it.'"
According to Klco, the close to 3,000 students that made it to the national competition represented just half of one percent of the 600,000-plus students who began the process last fall. The competitors at nationals came from all over the U.S. its territories and several other countries.
Klco encourages any area student in grades 4-12 that's interested in joining the team next year to reach out via email at janklco@whitehallschools.net.
“Many school district and community members supported the students in their endeavors, serving as practice judges, offering interviews, and contributing to the team financially," Klco said in a press release. "We wouldn’t be so successful without your enthusiastic support."
