HARLOWTON, Mt. — A Harlowton High School teacher is turning rural Montana into a living history classroom after receiving a $2,000 grant for a student-driven history project.
For juniors Azaria Davis and Reese Cooney, it all started with one sentence from their teacher.
Watch Taylor Olsen and students talk about the project:
"You can pick any topic and I'll help you find the sources you need," Cooney said Tuesday.
Any topic. Any era. The two students took that freedom and ran with it.
"We did like N.W.A and like parent advisory labels," Davis said.
Not exactly a typical history project — but that's the point.
"I feel like that's something we really try to do is like very niche, like unheard of topics," Davis said.
Teacher Taylor Olsen started the project with just 3 students. Now 9 are digging into overlooked stories and discovering unexpected connections close to home.
"We want to get them somehow connecting it into their community. And what's crazy, what we've realized is pretty much every topic in history is connected into this community," Olsen said.
And while students are learning, Olsen said she is too.
"They're able to see things way different than I am," Olsen said.
For senior Roan Peters, that meant researching the Chrysler Airflow — combining his love of cars with local history.
"I studied a lot about cars in my town, but I've never even heard about it. So, I don't know. It would be good to learn about it," Peters said.
The research has taken students beyond the classroom and into the community.
"I feel like the car community is special that way. And they preserve a lot of their, I don't know, like, there's a lot of people that keep it up, I guess, like the owners of them and that kind of thing. They do have a lot of different sources you can find and that kind of thing," Peters said.
Olsen said the goal is bigger than grades or presentations. It's about giving overlooked stories and the people connected to them a voice.
"We're really trying to find those niche stories in history and bring them to life and just give them a platform and a voice," Olsen said.
