BUCKFIELD — Eighth-grader Alexis Constantino said people don’t realize how important animal testing is in the discovery of cures for a variety of human diseases.

“Animal testing has helped a lot of people,” she said.

Alexis, a student at Buckfield Junior/Senior High School, is one of nearly 100 middle-schoolers and several high school students who have been working for the past three months on a variety of history projects.

On Tuesday night, parents and the community had a chance to check out the dozens of projects that followed this year’s National History Day theme of “Debate and Diplomacy in History: Successes, Failures and Consequences.”

Alexis, a Sumner resident, and her partners, Tiffani Rowe and Bethany Kraske, put together a website — http://76602311.nhd.weebly.com/ — devoted to animal testing for medical purposes.

Bethany said she has two cousins with diabetes and she hopes animal testing will help find a cure.

The project has led Bethany to consider going into the medical field. Alexis is thinking of nursing.

“I wasn’t for animal testing until I learned that those tests have helped many people,” Alexis said.

Jesse Warren, a Buckfield eighth-grader, decided to study the debate between Darwinism and creationism.

For his project, he created a display of photos and text. He also put together a 4-minute video depicting the Galapagos Islands where Darwin did much of his studies that led to the “Origin of the Species” and the theory of evolution.

“I feel strongly about creationism,” Jesse said. “This was the first project I thought of. We’ll never really know for sure (whether evolution or creationism is true).”

Seventh- and eighth-grade social studies teacher Donna Whitney said it was the second year Buckfield students have participated in History Day. She said some will travel to Augusta next week to compete with students from other schools.

Whitney said virtually all of her students worked with librarians Carol Huotari and Joanne Douglass, learning how to research. Some students borrowed books from the Maine State Library. Some borrowed books from the libraries of other schools in Western Foothills Regional School Unit 10.

Topics this year included the flappers of the 1920s, the 1967 Six-Day War, the Cuban Missile Crisis, Chamberlain’s philosophy of appeasement prior to World War II, the Scopes Monkey Trial and the atomic bomb. Displays, websites, documentary films and individual performances were used to convey the research behind the projects.

“These projects have given students a great sense of accomplishment,” Whitney said.

[email protected]