STUDENTS WIN NATIONAL AWARD

ADVANCE -- Most every student feels at some point that they deserved a better grade than they received on a project. It's a disappointment to work hard and not be rewarded for effort put forth.

Whitney McFerron, Jeremy Nall and Jared Ritter felt they should have received a better grade, and proved it, by placing first in the state and seventh in the nation in The National History Day Contest held in Washington D.C.

McFerron, Nall and Ritter participated in a Missouri History Day Contest for a seventh-grade project at Advance schools. Their project included a media presentation on the Orphan Train which the students completed by using video equipment in the mass media department at Southeast Missouri State University.

Although the group finished their research by March for the school project deadline, "we kept working on it for the national competition," McFerron said. "Every Friday we researched in our library at school. We also used Kent Library at SEMO and the Internet to find information."

The students finished the majority of the project by themselves in the video lab. "They did have someone in there to watch us, but that was just to make sure we didn't blow up any of the equipment while we were using it," Ritter said.

Nall said the trio chose the historical occurrence of the Orphan Train because the theme held some personal interest for him. Nall is adopted.

The Orphan Train concept started in Europe, he said. The Rev. Charles Loring began a society to aid children in the eastern part of the United States. Loring wanted to help the many children who lived and roamed the streets in New York City and other parts of the eastern seaboard. Children were sent by train to the Midwest to be taken in by farmers and their families. In September 1854 the first American Orphan Train went to southwestern Michigan to drop off children.

"Each person who wanted a kid had a number and so did all the kids. The person with a certain number got the kid with the same number." Adoption was not required and about 87 percent of children were satisfied with their new lives, Nall said.

"Some kids were abused, but mostly it was a better life than what they were used to," Nall said.

Jared Ritter said their greatest motivation came from their teacher who said if the group won first in the state or won at a national level he might consider raising their grade.

"That was when we decided we were going to go to state and win," said Ritter. "And we didn't change a thing before we went either."

The students competed against 76 other video presentation and advanced to the finals round, which included 12 videos.

Although first place honors would have been nice, Ritter wasn't disappointed with seventh place at the national level.

"We competed against 76 other videos, made the finals, which was the top 12 videos, and took seventh," Ritter said. "When you get that far you say, `If we win, we win, and if we lose we lose but we did our best.'" Ritter said.

His grandfather, Carl Ritter Sr., was extremely proud of his grandson's showing at a national level. "All the tapes were good and to judge a number one must have been hard," Carl Ritter Sr. said. "I'm a little partial, but the quality of the videos was impressive.

The videos which advanced to final rounds were shown during the contest. Other presentations included papers, presentation board and performances.