Two Renton students are raising funds to go to Washington D.C. to compete in the National History Day competition.

Chelsea Davatos and Rose Kelly, sixth graders from McKnight Middle School, won first place in the National History Day’s regional and statewide competitions, and have qualified for the national competition on June 11 to 15.

National History day is a nonprofit education organization that offers programs and competitions that encourage students to conduct historical research.

The contest allows participants to research in depth a topic, write a paper and present it through various mediums, including websites, presentations, etc.

Each year, NHD selects a theme for their contests and participants are to research and draw conclusions that relate to the theme. Adhering to this year’s theme, “taking a stand in history,” Davatos and Kelly decided to study Lea Miller and the anti-nepotism policy at University of Washington in the 1930s.

Miller, an arts professor at UW and wife of UW zoology professor, was fired after the university adopted a ruling in 1936 that banned two members of the same family to work at the school.

“During the Great depression there was an increase of women in the workforce and men at the time felt really threatened because it seemed it felt like women were being favored. This created the anti-nepotism policy at UW,” said Davatos.

Miller’s firing incited protests by other faculty and historians against the anti-nepotism policy. Those protests were one of the many that helped ignite prominent movements, including the American Feminist Movement in the 1960s and 1970s, Davotos explained.

“We really felt connected with her (Miller) just because without people like her and people who decided to protest against the norm of the time, we wouldn’t be where we are right now, we wouldn’t have the respect we have right now,” she said.

“We feel inspired by her and the many other women who went through this case because equality is a struggle for women today,” added Kelly.

Kelly and Davatos said they went to the UW’s special collections library, interviewed librarians, and searched the web intensively to not only find the historical events, but also to better understand the impact of the movement. Both said they were surprised by the attitudes of men during that time period.

“Society thought that women were stealing jobs from men from the depression era, so that was the reason that caused the anti-nepotism policy in place,” said Kelly. “That whole idea of the unfairness of women and thinking that men didn’t do anything wrong was surprising to us in the research.”

“I was surprised when men lost their jobs instead of finding a way to fix it, like president Roosevelt’s new deal, they decided to blame it on the markets that weren’t as affected, like the ones women worked in,” said Davatos. “That surprised me, that why they decided to blame their jobs instead of finding a way to fix it and regain employment.”

As part of their presentation, the duo prepared a skit, depicting people Miller would have encountered, including those opposing the protests like members from the Board of Regents and Lee Paul Sieg, the UW president at the time.

According to their social studies teacher and McKnight NHD teacher Jacqueline Eng, this project has helped Davatos and Kelly to not only become better scholars, but also develop their social skills.

“(NHD) really gets kids into the higher level thinking skills. The skills they need for college, like the research skills,” Eng said. “I think sixth graders who do NHD do way more research than college kids do. They go to archives, they go to museums, they do interviews, they contact people. It develops social skills… you’re forced to interact with people and ask those important questions. They come up with their own questions they have to ask to make those connections and analyze, synthesize information and put it together to present it.”

Currently, Davatos and Kelly are sharpening their presentation and are gearing up for the national stage at the University of Maryland in, all while raising funds for their trip to Washington D.C. They have set up a GoFundMe page to raise $3,000 for the trip.

To donate to their trip, visit https://www.gofundme.com/rose-chelsea-national-competition.