The Glen Ridge High School History Club, runner-up in the states earlier this year and winner of the southern regional title also, traveled to Orlando, Fla., last month, for the History Bowl — the middle school championships for students of history.
According to club advisor Dave Majewski, the competition was very tough, as you would imagine, and the hometown team was eliminated, winning two matches and losing four. Sixty-three teams from 40 states competed.
“All the teams had six preliminary matches,” Majewski said. “We did not make it to the playoffs.”
But the silver lining he saw which he felt his team could be proud of was that Princeton Middle School, which they defeated this year, took third-place overall. The winning team was Challenger-Aldenwood, from Ca., and the second-place school was River Trail, from Ga. This was the very first year GRHS has been involved with interscholastic history competitions. Preparing for the bowl, they reviewed questions from previous tournaments.
“There were a lot of questions (this year) from the Middle Ages,” Majewski said, “and wars around the world. I’m not sure why. There were a lot of topics and it covered ancient gods. That’s something we’ll look forward to for next year.”
The kids were a little disappointed with the results, he said, especially after having done so well in New Jersey competitions early on.
“But they understood this competition was for the best of the best and it made them more excited to go back next year,” he said.
Come September, Majewski will predict what topics the next bowl will concentrate and try to get as much knowledge as possible in those areas. The team will also compete in tournaments leading up to the nationals.
“We had nine kids in the Nationals this year,” he said. “All nine are returning. Hopefully, we’ll get more kids next year. There’s no limit to how many kids go to the Nationals as long as they compete during the year and qualify. I was most proud that we brought the second-most kids to the tournament.”
The history club offers students weekly meetings, field trips and the chance to compete in the tournaments. On the afternoon Majewski spoke to this newspaper, the kids were having a raucous pizza party.
”We have close to 40 kids in the history club,” he said. “I established it and it’s in its eighth year. Being a teacher, I knew there was a need for it and a club driven by what the kids wanted to learn. The club has grown and expanded. Now we compete in tournaments and this gives the kids an avenue to compete. It doesn’t have to be athletics. And next year we hope to compete in geography as well as history. There’s definitely a group that loves geography. It’s important to find avenues for them to compete. When kids compete, they dedicate themselves at a different level. You can’t get away from the results. Same thing with athletics. There’s a scoreboard and at the end of the day, they know how much effort they put into it.”
Majewski has been a district teacher for 18 years. He teaches history with geography incorporated into the lessons. The students who represented Glen Ridge at the Nationals were Finn Peterson, Leo Holzaphel, Steven Majewski, Ekambir Potkuchi, Nate McCarthy, Soren Razo, Insoo Ju, Mark Budko and Seth Thrikawala.
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