Glenn Mitchell, senior lecturer in history at UOW, made the comments on Tuesday about students from Lumen Christi Catholic College and Eden Marine High School he was tutoring as part of a workshop.

The students were learning tips on how to do their major projects for History Extension from Dr Mitchell at the UOW Bega campus.

“My guess is they are all going to get very good marks,” Dr Mitchell said. 

“They are all extremely articulate and have already grappled with complex issues many historians struggle to understand.” 

It is the first time someone from UOW has visited the Bega campus to run this workshop, with students usually joining in a video conference. 

The diverse range of ideas the students had about topics they wanted to focus on for their major works included the impact of the Spanish civil war, changing perspectives on homosexuality, what a life sentence means for criminals and aspects of the Renaissance.

Dr Mitchell’s main tip for students was for them to focus on a smaller idea, “as they all wanted to write a history of the world”.

“The students are all very passionate and began with projects that are far too big,” he said.

“To make them more enjoyable they have to shrink them.” 

Also, he said it was important to write simple, effective and accessible prose – a skill that many historians who tended to write for the elite market did not have.

“If you can write that way, employers will look at you because that is what the world wants,” he said. 

History books need to be presented in a way that anyone can understand them, he said. 

When asked how historians manage to remember countless details, facts and years, Dr Mitchell said “I don’t have an answer, it just happens”.

“One of the reasons why we are able to recall things could be because they have made an impact on us,” he said.

“Maybe a lot of history is forgotten because it is not nice to remember.” 

A similar workshop will be run next year.