A
Alumni Spotlight
s an organization, National History Day is dedicated
to the students and teachers who participate in our
programs. Over 10 million students have participated
from all 50 states, D.C., American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico,
and International Schools in China, Korea, and South Asia. To
show our ongoing support for all who have come before and
those who will join us in the years to come, NHD is founding
the NHD Alumni Network, to engage and connect with former
students around the world. Building our network will allow
alumni to build connections and contacts outside of their nine
to five network, and allow them to continue demonstrating
their support for NHD activities. Our alumni include lawyers,
doctors, Pulitzer winners, foundation leaders, television
hosts and more.
One such very engaged alum, Jon Gillum, did not come to NHD
willingly. His 6th grade teacher in Baytown, Texas, required
his geography class to participate, and Jon reluctantly
prepared a group documentary on Morse Code in 1987-88.
“It was pretty laughable in hindsight. I pretended to be a
Nightline anchor in the video, and we had only five sources in
our bibliography—one of which was a dictionary. Somehow,
though, we advanced to the state competition, and after that
I was hooked.”
During the next six years, Jon advanced to the national contest
five years in a row, placed in the top ten in the nation in three
different categories, and won first place at the national contest
two years in a row.
Since then Jon has remained involved with NHD as a judge,
mentor, and speaker. He currently serves on the NHD Board of
Trustees as well as the Education Committee of the Texas State
Historical Association, which administers the NHD program
in Texas. “The reason I have stayed involved in NHD for the
past 26 years is that NHD is a life-changing experience for most
students, regardless of whether you win a prize. The research,
writing, and analytical skills that NHD develops are unmatched,
and they personally gave me a tremendous advantage in college,
26
graduate school, and ultimately in my career.”
NATIONAL HISTORY DAY 2015
Jon Gillum, Senior Counsel at Locke Lord LLP and NHD Alum.
Jon now practices administrative law and commercial
litigation in the Austin office of Locke Lord LLP. “Most NHD
participants—just like me—do not ultimately become
professional historians. But what those students learn from
NHD allows them to become professionals at anything to
which they set their minds.”
NHD challenges students to expand their knowledge and
capacity for research beyond those required in most class
curriculum. It is proven that these students outperform
their non-NHD peers on state standardized tests in multiple
subjects, including reading, science and math, as well as
history. We are asking all teachers, parents, partners, and
other members of our network to help NHD with this
effort by encouraging them to reach out to former NHD
students and telling them to join our network through
www.nhd.org/alumni.htm.