Tatiana Poggi, a seventh grader at GPS won first place in the American History Essay Contest sponsored by the Chickamauga Chapter of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution (NSDAR).
Tatiana, a student in Leland Strang’s history class, received a certificate for her essay, which will go on to the Tennessee State DAR for further judging, according to Lee Parham, the Chapter Regent who presented the award in Middle School assembly in mid-January.
The directions for the essay contest were to write about “Forgotten Patriots Who Supported the American Struggle for Independence.” According to Tatiana, she arrived home with the assignment and told her father, who had just finished a book on Brigadier General Thaddeus Kosciuszko.
She researched the Polish general who came to the United States in 1776 and whose plans for the Battle of Saratoga ensured the American victory there; he was also instrumental in victories by the Southern Army in the Carolinas. “I was amazed at how unknown he was,” she said. “He was almost a founding father.” A statue of the general is located in Washington, D.C.
The essay contest for grades five through eight is open to students in public, private, and parochial schools, as well as home study programs. According to the DAR, the contest was "established to encourage young people to thing creatively about our nation's great history and learn about history in a new light."