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Mike Conroy
08
Project
History Club
Summary
Allegany-Limestone Central School
Historical topics with
greatest depth of expertise: U.S. History 1850 to
present
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General
Overview of the Proposed Project:
History club- I
propose to run a history club that will run during the school year
from September to June of 2008. Within this club we will have a
number of different objectives, activities, and purposes. The
overall goal is to open up a number of possibilities for students
with a passion for history and social studies. These possibilities
will run from simply meeting and discussing history and current
events to participation in debates, competitions, and fundraising
events sponsored by our club. This club will meet weekly to meet
its objectives.
2. Clear Purpose
and Objective:
The purpose and
objective of this club is to attract and retain Middle and High
School students with a passion for history. This will be a student
run club with its own set of officers including a treasurer,
secretary, vice president, and president. The club will pursue its
activities in mind of Allegany-Limestone school goals. First to
develop students ability to effectively communicate, second, that
students become critical creative thinkers, third that students
become collaborative problem solvers
3. Stakeholders:
grade level, who will benefit, who will participate in this project.
Students from both the
Middle and High School are invited to join the History club. We
will even have a few elementary students participating in certain
events.
4. U.S. History
Content Area
U.S. History content
will be brought into the club through several activities. A few of
these will be the National History Day competition and the “We the
People” Constitutional program. We will also compete in our local
World War II competition.
5. Outline
Describing Content
Club possibilities
will include: 1) National History Day competition (preparation and
participation) 2) “We the People” participation 3) Debate format
–both current and past events 4) Interact participation (Rotary
based International Action) 5) World War II competition in Eldred
PA WWII museum 6) Movie Night –current and past historically
significant films 7) Guest speakers 8) Field trips
6. Software to be
used, internet materials, contacts, etc.
The primary equipment
used will be the Interwrite board in my classroom which is connected
to a projector, the internet , and a VCR.
7. Level of
Student Involvement
This will be a student
run club and therefore the student involvement will be at a very
high level. It is for both Middle and High School students.
Individual student participation is voluntary but the students we
are seeking are those with a passion for history.
8. Evaluation
process (include students when possible)
Evaluation of the
club’s process will come through our success throughout the year.
Student projects and participation will be an excellent gage of how
we will proceed.
9. Timeline: how
you envision the project being carried out between start up and
conclusion
Officers will be
selected in September (already done) Meetings will be held weekly
with an ambitious schedule for the coming year. Participation in
National History Day competition will begin in October. Committees
will be assigned with various duties for upcoming events.
Conroy Proposal in
Word
Michael F Conroy
8th Grade Social Studies
U.S. History 1850’s to present
716-375-6600 x2264
Reflection for
History/Interact Club 2007-2008
The year began with a phone call
from Allegany-Limestone’s superintendent Diane Munroe to myself and
last year’s History club Vice-President Faith Benson. She asked us
to expand the outreach portion of the club and to consider teaming
with the local Rotary Club chapter in forming an Interact Club
(International Action) for Allegany-Limestone. We both agreed and
thus began our year as Allegany-Limestone History/Interact Club.
We conducted regular meetings
every Wednesday after school from 3pm to 4pm. We began with the
concept of switching our focus from week to week from outreach to
history. We elected two sets of officers for each section. We
found after a short period of time that we had plenty of time to
combine the meeting and that activities could be coordinated to both
purposes. We spent many afternoons discussing relevant issues in
the world and their relevant connections to history
A good example of our coordination
was our movie night program. We organized three movie nights to
raise money for our chosen international aid charities. We began
with a focus on the situation on Darfur so we chose three movies
with an African theme to better acquaint our audiences with some of
the bigger problems that African’s face. We also chose movies that
would entertain as well as educate. The movies we watched were
“Blood Diamonds”, Black hawk Down”, and “The Kingdom”. We did not
charge admission but we did ask for donations. As a result we
raised several hundred dollars for three separate charities.
The history students had their
biggest success at the World War II competition. This was held in
Eldred Pennsylvania’s World War II Museum. This was our second year
going and our second year to come home with the first place trophy.
The competition was stiff this year as 14 teams competed. We
fielded two teams and both placed in the final round. Our first
team won the championship round while our second team came in
third. It was the highlight of the year for many of our new and
second year members.
Reflection: Overall we had a successful
year. One thing we want to do next year is to split the two clubs.
We need to afford more time for the separate pursuits. We had many
crossover students but time was an issue. Our intention was to
compete within the National History Day competition but there as not
enough time in our afternoon meetings to cover this interest. Next
year we will have a separate time and location for those students
seriously interested in that competition. Another consideration we
have is to upgrade our student leadership. We have several highly
motivated students in the club but their time is spread out among
various sport and academic pursuits. We need some of our younger
members to step up and replace our upper classmen. We have a lot of
great ideas but we need more students to pick up the pace. We also
need to be much more ambitious when it comes to fundraising. W did
very well with what we tried but there is much more we can do. We
donated everything we made this year to charity but we need to start
a fund for ourselves for both the Interact and history club sides.
Looking Forward
We have a very ambitious idea for early next
year with multiple events planned over one weekend in September. We
plan to build several separate fundraising efforts into our one
event. Some of the funds will benefit Interact and others will be
put toward a history club fund. We will also coordinate our
fundraising efforts to match the Rotary program. They have several
well established programs that fit well with our club goals. One
fund-raiser of interest is the Purple Pinky drive to eradicate Polio
in the world. This program will get us into the elementary school
for fundraising for the first time.
We will split the two meeting times to better
accommodate the separate needs of the two clubs. The history club
has an opportunity to utilize the Allegany Historical Society
building. It is an old church in the village and we may plan “out
of school” meetings with the express purpose of National History Day
preparations.
By BRIAN LOTHRIDGE
Olean Times Herald
ALLEGANY — The Allegany-Limestone Central School District Interact
Club is now an officially chartered club.
The group is a service club for students sponsored by Rotary
International and received its charter two weeks ago. The group,
which
stands for International Action, is combined with the district’s
History Club and is under the direction of Mike Conroy, eighth-grade
social studies teacher.
Mr. Conroy and Diane Munro, district superintendent, discussed
forming
the Interact Club last summer and both felt that student Faith
Benson
would be a good person to help pioneer the group.
The group began the school year with a battle of the bands concert
to
raise money to help people suffering from the genocide in Darfur,
Africa. The concert brought in $500 to $600.
“Money is great and donations are fantastic but what we really want
to do is raise awareness so that everyone knows about it and so that
everyone can do something about it,” Ms. Benson said.
The club began hosting movie nights for students and has shown
“Blackhawk Down,” “Blood Diamond” and “Kingdom.” Social
studies teachers have offered extra credit for the students to go
watch
as the movies have educational relevance, Ms. Benson said.
The group has raised money by asking for donations for the movie
nights
and selling bracelets, baked goods and T-shirts. All the money goes
to
charity, Ms. Benson said. The group will have a booth set up at the
district arts festival this Thursday.
History and Interact club members plan to visit nursing homes next
week
to speak with war veterans and other residents. They would like to
volunteer in local soup kitchens and set up the Purple Pinky
Project, a
Rotary initiative that raises money for vaccinations for Africans.
Club members are planning a weekend trip to St. Luke’s Mission in
Buffalo this summer. They will help the mission with cleaning the
church
and campus, feeding the poor and whatever else they can do, said
student
Rick Trietley. Mr. Trietley said he has helped at the mission with a
church group he is involved with.
“It’s really awe inspiring to just see how these people go through
so much and they are just like you and me,” he said.
The two-year-old History Club formed around the idea that students
would compete in the National History Day program. The club also has
had
members compete in the High School History Challenge at the World
War II
Museum in Eldred, Pa. Two teams went from the club and placed first
and
third in the competition out of 14 teams. This is the second year in
a
row that the district has won the competition.
“It was a great experience,” said student Ryan Lamberson, whose
team placed first. “I think it was the best day of the year.”
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