- March 28, 2025
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Although Sarasota Middle School teacher Jennifer Jaso says there is plenty of history students can learn in the classroom, she wanted to offer them the chance to go even further.
For 18 years, she has been involved with the National History Day Contest, having led an effort to bring the competition to the district level.
On Feb. 22, the contest returned to Selby Library, giving around 800 students the chance to showcase, to a panel of judges, their work performing research and exploring sources that could include the National Archives and the Library of Congress.
It was a chance for them to present results of research they had started in August, on this year's theme of Rights and Responsibilities in History.
The contest is the preliminary opportunity for students to participate at the Florida History Day Contest and the national level of the competition.
Students who participate in the program, which also welcomes students from private schools and homeschool students, research a topic of their choice, creating exhibits, documentaries, performances, websites, and papers.
For Tommy Burkhardt, a sixth grader at Sarasota Middle School who plays soccer and tennis, the topic was one that combined his interest in sports with an issue still relevant today.
He chose to write a paper on the Munich massacre terrorist attack during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich.
"It really stood out to me how the joyful Olympics where we're all supposed to be unified every four years, turned into such a massacre," Burkhardt said.
"Because they are so invested in the topic that they chose, it gives them a chance to really dig deeper and find something beneath the surface, as far as how this impacted short term, but how it also impacts on a much larger scale," Jaso said.
The attacks occurred when the Palestinian militant organization Black September infiltrated the Olympic Village and killed two members of the Israeli Olympic team, taking nine team members hostage.
The militants later killed the hostages during a failed rescue attempt.
Burkhardt said what drew him to the topic is the long history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and how it continues today.
He set out on a search for primary and secondary sources, with some sources including the book "One Day in September" and the Israel Forever Foundation.
Jaso said students can draw from a variety of information, and that local archaeologists and historians have partnered with students, while the library's resources have also been helpful.
"Our history center here is great with allowing students to come in and work with documents, and they work with them one on one, to help them grow stronger in the research process, but also get them exposed to things they wouldn't normally find on the internet or just by entering a library," she said.
Burkhardt spoke with both of his sets of grandparents, who were alive at the time of the events, to understand their perspective, coming to understand how shocking the tragedy was to them.
"His grandfather called this morning. He's like, 'I learned some things from your paper that I didn't know before," said his mother Shannon Burkhardt.
"All these attacks in the past, they just lead to more and more and more, and it's still ongoing," Tommy Burkhardt said. "Violence isn't the answer, because... none of it has stopped today."
Shannon Burkhardt said the experience also raised some important questions.
"I think probably one of the most educational things for him, is having to stretch his brain and figure out, what are, what are my rights? What are my responsibilities? What is the government's responsibility?" she said.
