Local student spoke at first event for Oregon’s 150th Anniversary

Oregon is starting early to plan its Sesquicentennial, or 150th Statehood Anniversary. Although 2009 marks the anniversary, Oregonians are already meeting to develop a shared vision for the celebration.

For the first planning session, the Oregon Heritage Commission directed by Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski wanted to find a speaker to represent the youth of the state. They found the perfect person living in Camp Sherman.

“It’s just an opportunity that doesn’t come along every day,” said 15-year-old Kelsey White.

The soon-to-be sophomore at Sisters High School, where she is a 4.0 student, has had many speaking honors. However, her speech at Willamette University in Salem this May would be to one of her largest and most estimable audiences.

“I don’t really like public speaking so much but I end up doing it a lot,” said White.

She said her knees were shaking as she stood on the stage with a spotlight shining on her. White overcame her nerves by reminding herself that nothing bad was going to happen.

White came to the Heritage Commission’s attention through her success in the National History Day contest. In 2004, she placed first in the country. Each year, more than 770,000 students from around the United States enter the contest. White won with her 10-minute video documentary in the Junior Individual Documentary division titled, Encounters with the Civil Rights Movement: Television Takes Flight.

She began participating in National History Day in the fifth grade and has continued each year since.

“We were very pleased and it helped set a positive tone for the day’s events,” said Kyle Jansson with the Oregon Heritage Commission. Jansson said White was the perfect choice since she is a very capable speaker who has shown such an interest in history.

“We asked her to talk about what it meant to her to be an Oregonian,” said Jansson.

White told the story of her education in the two-room schoolhouse of Black Butte School. She graduated from the eighth grade in a class of four, which was the largest class size for the school. She said the personal attention students receive results in an “amazing” education and she feels it gives young students confidence.

“We found that each of us was capable of much more than we could imagine,” said White about the lessons learned in her small school. Although Black Butte is a small school, students go on big field trips to places including Washington D.C., Pennsylvania, and Virginia where White says she “was able to live history.”

The day-long planning event for Oregon’s anniversary featured speakers from diverse backgrounds and allowed time for group discussions. Conversations that day included how to honor Oregon’s history, how to bring Oregonians together on common ground, and how to establish a lasting legacy.

This fall, the Oregon Heritage Commission will coordinate a second planning event on how best to celebrate Oregon’s 150th anniversary.