Students from ten schools in four northern Louisiana parishes recently gathered in Louisiana Tech University’s Student Center to present written projects and oral presentations in the 2011 Region II Social Studies Fair. The event is held annually to help promote the development of social science skills in grade school, junior high, and high school students. Students prepare projects in subject areas such as anthropology, economics, geography, history, political science, and sociology. “Students benefit in several ways,” said Dr. Jason Pigg, director of the Region II Social Studies Fair, and associate professor of political science and head of the Social Sciences Department at Louisiana Tech.  “They gain a more in-depth understanding of a specific social studies topic than they would in the classroom, and they gain research, writing, visual presentation, and speaking skills during the course of the project.” Students from Choudrant Elementary, Cedar Creek, I.A. Lewis, Glen View, Hillcrest, Ruston Elementary, Cypress Springs, A. E. Phillips, Choudrant High School, and Bethel Christian participated in the Fair.  First and second place winners go onto the state competition, which will be held in Lake Charles on May 10. Louisiana Tech’s Department of Social Sciences coordinated the Fair, sending out and collecting the project applications, and setting up the fair itself.  Current and past faculty members from the Department as well as graduate students from the Department of History served as judges. Pigg said he and the judges were amazed by the diversity of subjects among the projects.  “Some examples include “Saving Sparta,” “Dance Around the World,” “What it Takes to be an FBI Agent,” “How Close is Too Close,” “History of Medicine,” and my favorite title, “The Stinking Truth” which was about garbage.” “The judges were impressed by how hard the students and the teachers worked in preparing the projects this year.  Selecting the winners was a difficult task.” Overall group and individual winners in each division were: Division I (Grades 4-6)

• Individual: Reed Sexton – I.A. Lewis; What it Takes to be an FBI Agent (Political Science)
• Group: Rylee Park, Joanna Ham – Hillcrest; How Close is Too Close (Sociology)

Division II (Junior High)

• Individual: Hunter Craighead – Cedar Creek; Alligator Farming (Economics)
• Group: Kailee Rivera, Caroline Garrett, Ryan Duke – A.E. Phillips; The Stinking Truth (Geography)

Division III (High School)

• Individual: Sanjna Rai – Cedar Creek; History of Medicine (History)
• Group: Justine Ker, John McCallum – Cedar Creek; The Tragedy of the Commons (Economics)

For a list of all Region II Social Studies Fair winners, please click here.