It is almost here!

Tomorrow is Ohio History Day. So what's going on here? Well in about 20 minutes, me, other staff, interns and all our worldly Ohio History Day possessions will caravan the 2.5 miles to Columbus State Community College and begin setting up. Then we'll rush back to the Ohio Historical Center for the pizza reception. Good fun for all!

Tomorrow is a whirlwind of a day for us between getting everyone checked in, dealing with the problems (all will be solved, our motto is EVERYTHING WILL BE OK!), getting the judges trained and out to the rooms, collecting results, posting run offs, and final preparations for the awards ceremony, there's not a lot of down time. During your down time, we encourage you to:

Visit the Ohio Historical Center
Visit COSI
Take a tour of the Ohio Statehouse
Visit the visitor's center for the Ohio Supreme Court

Best of luck to all the participants and I'll see you on the other side!

The Judging Schedule is online!

Click here to view!

Some things to note: WD stands for the Center for Workforce Development. DH stands for Delaware Hall. If there is no letters, it is in the Center for Workforce Development.

Papers and Exhibits are in Delaware Hall. (plus the Youth Division)
All other projects are in the Center for Workforce Development.

What to Expect at Ohio History Day

In 11 days, almost 600 students will converge on the campus of Columbus State Community College for Ohio History Day, competing for a few spots to represent Ohio at National History Day. What will it be like?

On April 17th, we will post the schedule on the National History Day in Ohio web site. Your judging time will indicate when you will either be interviewed (papers, exhibits and web sites), perform (performances), or show your documentary. PLEASE NOTE: Exhibits need to be set up between 7:30 and 9:00 am, otherwise you'll only have the 15 minutes before your judging time to set up. If you are doing a Junior Individual Performance or a Documentary, you may get a call back and have a second round of judging between 1:00 pm and 2:30 pm.

The Day of the Big Event!

7:30 am- 9:00 am-
Exhibit Set-Up and Check In
All exhibits should report to Delaware Hall. All other projects should report to the Center of Workforce Development. Check in allows you to double check your judging time, ask any questions, and pick up information you'll need for the day.

9:00 am- noon-
Judging

All projects will have judging time sometime between 9 and noon. Exhibits will all be in the Delaware Hall Gymnasium. Performances will be on the 4th floor of the Center for Workforce Development. Documentaries will be on the 3rd & 4th floors of the Center for Workforce Development. Web Sites will be on the 4th and 3rd floors of the CWD and Papers will be in Delaware Hall.

12:30- Run Off Announcements

In the 1st Floor Lobby of the Center for Workforce Development, we will post the Junior Individual Performances and all documentaries that will need to show their projects for a second time. Judging will take place between 1-2:30pm. All documentaries will be on the 3rd floor of the CWD and Junior Individual Performances will be on the 4th floor.

12:00 pm- 1:00 pm

Exhibits Open to the Public
All exhibits must stay up until after 2:30. There will be a second round of judging, but since there are no interviews during second round, we will not make any announcements.

1:00 pm- 2:30 pm
Junior Individual Performance Run Offs
All Documentary Run Offs
Exhibit Hall Closed for Run Offs

2:30 pm- 3:30 pm
Exhibit hall open for tear down

4:00 pm
Awards Ceremony
Palace Theater
Due to the size of our event, there are only a few venues in Columbus that will hold our awards ceremony. The awards ceremony will be held off campus. For information about the Palace Theater click href="http://www.capa.com/columbus/venues/palace_about.php">here.

Lunch Time- Delaware Hall has a cafeteria that will be open and expecting our group from 7:30 am until 2:30 pm.

Interviews- The judges will ask questions for all categories. The interview does not weigh heavily in the overall evaluation, but helps to clarify questions that the judges may have about your project.

Evaluation Forms- The evaluation forms will be sent back to teachers in the days after the event. I wish we could hand them back sooner, but this is an office of two people and we hope to have them sorted and out the door in Monday (the 27th)'s mail.

It's a big, exciting, crazy, fun day. Let me know if you have questions, I'd be happy to answer them.

Only 18 More Days Left!

Well we're back from a week of OHS furlough and time for Ohio History Day is very close!

All of the regional events are over. If you'd like to see results from an event, click here and find your county on the map.

The registration deadline for Ohio History Day is April 11th, so make sure to get your forms in the mail to us. Web Site entries need to send one copy of their web site on CD or flash drive and four copies of the process paper and annotated bibliography. Paper entries need to send four copies of their papers.

Some tips for preparing for Ohio History Day:

- Read your judge comments from your District History Day event
- Make revisions to your project. Historians are constantly revising their work, and your project should evolve as your receive feedback.
- Read over the State Qualifiers Packet, it will answer questions about timing, locations, parking and eating at Ohio History Day.
- If you have a documentary, make sure it is formatted in a universal format. If you've created the documentary in something like Windows Movie Maker, you need to export or save the file as something universal. Double-check your documentary on several different computers or DVD players. Staff at Ohio History Day will do everything possible to make sure your documentary plays, but doing the double checking ahead of time can save a lot of headaches.
- Exhibits should bring an emergency kit in case a label or something falls off your exhibit while being transported.

Send me your questions and we'll be happy to help.

Happy History Day-ing!