Every year, students in U.S. History Honors classes are required to participate in an event called National History Day (NHD), where students spend months creating a project of their own that relates to that year’s theme. 

This year, the theme was “Frontiers in History,” meaning that projects could be about a single invention, event, or person that was exploring new fields or ideas that initially had defined limits. Students also had the option to work individually or in a small group, and to create either a visual project, documentary, write a paper or perform a skit. 

Camille Merganthaler ’25 was one of the few people to present a live skit to the judges. Her performance qualified her for the national competition, where she has the opportunity to place nationwide in her category.

Merganthaler’s skit is about the Food Network and how it impacts women in the culinary industry.  

“[Food Network] allowed women to recognize that they were capable of being successful,” she said.  

For her performance she divided a table into two sections. On one side of the table she presented pictures of women and on the other side she had her cooking oven so she could bake cookies on stage. 

Additionally, Merganthaler had to memorize an extensive script and prepare for any follow-up questions from the judges.

The first NHD competition was regionals and took place on March 18, with many Staples students also competing. Mergenthaler enjoyed the regional competition and was pleased with the judges and their attitude during the competition. However, as she progressed to states, the laid-back atmosphere gave way to rising pressure. 

“States was definitely more stressful,” she said, “especially the couple of days leading up to it since I had to perform in a big auditorium with people watching.” 

The final competition is going to be held at the University of Maryland on June 12. Merganthaler is leaving school in the middle of final exams in order to compete at Nationals. 

“I’m pretty psyched I get to go to Washington D.C.,” she said.

While missing class during final exams will be challenging to make up, Merganthaler’s history teacher, Nell-Ayn Lynch, helped relive some of the load by promising an automatic 100% for a grade on the final project to anyone who made it to Nationals.

“I’m definitely happy as this is one less final I have to worry about,” Merganthaler said. “I’ll probably be spending the time prepping for Nationals, but this is definitely a lot off my plate.”