The Great History Challenge is a three-phase competition for middle schoolers. Students start off with an online game-based competition, then advance to a buzzer-based Regional competition and then to Nationals. The Rockford Quiz Bowl Company provides custom questions for the Regional and National competition phases.
Question Philosophy and Distribution
Each round has twenty questions. Every question has three short clues that all point to the same answer. These clues are read one at a time; the first is hard, the second is of medium difficulty, and the third is easy. Question content is history-focused, and does not address events that occurred after the year 2000. Each round has one question each in the following topics:
United States History: 7 questions per 20-question round. These questions are divided by topic.
- U.S. Presidents
- Presidents of the United States and topics related to them
- Political History
- History of the creation and operation government positions, and topics related to participation in government, such as voting rights
- Legal History
- Topics related to the Constitution of the United States, legal cases, laws, judicial bodies, and judicial procedure
- Military History
- Military commanders, battles, wars, and topics related to conflicts in which the United States was a participant
- Economics
- Financial institutions, fiscal policy, depressions and recessions, economic concepts, and business history
- Social History
- Cultural events and figures, and topics related to grassroots political actions, such as citizenship and civil rights
- Miscellaneous U.S. History
- One extra question covering one of the topics above OR covering a topic that does not fit into one of those topics
Ancient History: 7 questions per 20-question round. These questions are divided by time periods and cover prehistory to 1799.
- History Before the Common Era (BCE/BC)
- 1st-14th Century History
- 15th-17th Century European History
- 15th-17th Century World History
- 18th Century European History
- 18th Century World History
- Miscellaneous Ancient History
Modern History: 6 questions per 20-question round. These questions are divided by time periods and cover 1800 to 1999.
- 19th Century European History
- 19th Century World History
- Miscellaneous 19th Century History
- 20th Century European History
- 20th Century World History
- Miscellaneous 20th Century History