CHARLESTON, W.Va.— A little more than 300 projects and over 400 students from across the state filled the Charleston Coliseum and Convention Center Friday to present social studies topics they are passionate about.
Since 1977, the West Virginia Department of Education has hosted the annual Social Studies Fair at the convention center, bringing in grades 3 through 12 to display their work among nine different categories. The categories include: U.S History, World History, Geography, Psychology, Sociology, Anthropology, Economics, Political Science, and State and Local Studies.
The students research a topic within one of those nine categories, they create a display and present an oral presentation to judges. State Social Studies Coordinator, Dustin Lambert said the competition allows students to show off their passions and hard work.
“This event allows our students to showcase their skills and their interests in social studies,” Lambert said.
Fourth grade student from Wirt County, Shyanne Starkey did her project on how the full moon can affect human behavior, and through lots of research, she learned that it doesn’t have an affect.
“I used some research online and when I found out the actual reason I was like, ‘what?!” Starkey told MetroNews upon being judged during Friday’s fair.
After participating in the fair last year, Starkey is passionate about the topics she researches and said that the moon was of particular interest to her.
“I actually had a phase with space once and I was so obsessed with the moon,” Starkey said.
Two eighth graders from Marlinton Middle School in Pocahontas County, Riyan Gladwell and Kenslee Lane, did research on a bit more of a serious phycological topic– Bipolar Depression.
Gladwell said she learned a lot about the disorder through their research on the project, such as how people’s understanding of it continues to evolve.
“We studied the history of it and found out a lot of cool ideas, and how it has changed over time, the treatment of it, we found out that it had a lot of helpful things over time that caused the treatment to help people rather than disrespect them in a way,” she said.
The students said they chose the project because some of their family suffers from the disorder, and throughout their research, they realized that a lot more people they know suffer from it, as well.
“It felt good to spread awareness on it in a way,” Gladwell said.
“And not to be ashamed about mental health,” added Lane.
“Some people are ashamed by their mental health and don’t want to admit that they have something wrong mentally,” said Gladwell.
The social studies competition begins at the school level, advances to the county and then onto regional, and Friday’s event in Charleston is the last step in the process, Lambert said, at the state level.
He said when students make it to state level, they have accomplished a lot.
“That students have made it this far, really says something about their project, their research, and their presentation, so that they’re here at the state level, they’ve got something going on,” said Lambert.
The final judging results for the social studies fair was going to be updated to the West Virginia Department of Education’s Facebook page after 4 p.m. Friday.