The Evansville Vanderburgh School Corporation and the Evansville Bar Association (EBA) today announced a collaboration that will enable students enrolled in Reitz High School’s award-winning “Feel the History” program to produce a video celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Evansville Bar Association.

Krista Lockyear, President of the EBA (and partner at the law firm Rudolph, Fine, Porter & Johnson, LLP), said that the EBA has embarked on a two part project to celebrate its 100th Anniversary; 1) raising approximately $300,000 to facilitate the restoration of the Old Courthouse Superior Courtroom (to be renamed “The Randall T. Shepard Courtroom”); and 2) a history of law practice in Evansville for the last 100 years.  For the history project, the EBA commissioned historian Bill Bartelt to collect 100 years of history of the practice of law in Vanderburgh County.  “Because the EBA has a goal of working to educate the public on the practice of law, we thought what better way to celebrate our anniversary, than to collaborate with the Feel the History Program,” she said. “We could help them through a donation to purchase new equipment, and in turn, they could produce a video of our history for our celebration in April 2011.”

It is the hope of the EBA that the video and information gathered by Bartelt will also be used for classroom curriculum in the EVSC, as well as for the association’s website and as part of a permanent history display in the old courthouse.

Jeremy Villines, Reitz High School Feel the History teacher, said students will be divided in several groups, each with its own subject matter.  Subjects would include: race relations, women in the law, …… more titles please???  The Young Lawyers Section of the EBA will work closely with the high school students answering questions about things related to law to help students better understand information that has been gathered, and by doing critical reviews of finished pieces.

“We are very excited about this project,” Lockyear said.

Feel the History began as a course at Reitz High School in 2006, then taught by current eLearning Coach Jon Carl, who co-developed the program with the assistance of EVSC Integrating Technology and Curriculum Specialist Terry Hughes. “Feel the History was a totally different way of teaching U.S. History,” Carl said. He explained to his students that when you go to historical sites you feel the history – you see the sights, hear the sounds,  smell the odors of the place, which help you to envision the history. “It is a totally different approach, where we turn kids on to history by turning them into historians. They produce short historical documentaries and are responsible for every phase of production.”  

This year has been dubbed Feel the History 2.0, as the program transitions into high definition videography and editing, with the EBA anniversary as its first project.

Among the awards won for work with Feel the History includes:

• 2009 Grand Prize Winner for school districts over 20,000 in the American School Board Journal’s Magna Awards

• 2008 Team of students won first place in the Adobe School Innovation Awards

• 2008 Adobe recognized Feel the History as an “Educational Success Story” featured on its website

• 2008 Jon Carl and Terry Hughes honored by the Indiana Computer Educators organization as Teacher of the Year and Technology Education Advocate

• 2007 Carl named the National School Boards Associations list of 20 to Watch

• Carl named the Caleb Mills History Educator of the Year by the Indiana Historical Society