Brainstorming Post for collective good Interview Questions. From Mike

Students, using the Comments section below, please post your the five best interview questions you have based on the themes of ECCENTRICITY or DREAMS.

This way we have a multitude of questions to pick from, rewrite, and use for our interviews for the last Creative Profile essay.

Snapshot 6 on Holding On by Mohammed Baseer

I think no one likes to remember the times when they experienced failure to accomplish their objectives and their struggle to hold on in the life. But it is my own painful memories that give me the courage to rise above and dream beyond what is common.

I had always tried to work hard as much as possible to achieve better grades but when my world turned upside down in my most crucial high school years I found it so difficult to focus on studies and so easy to divert away. Eventually I got a D in my ninth grade and I was almost losing hope in my studies.

One day I came back from school to find out that my grandma was in the ER. She was complaining about chest pain and she was been taken to the hospital immediately. Later as I patiently waited for her test results to come back I realized how unpredictable life is. I can perfectly remember those times as I went to the hospital to see my grandma, there was this disinfectant used all over the hospital whose smell made me more sad. As I was about to enter the ER, a doctor came and said, “You must be at least 18 years old to enter this place,” and I had to go back and sit on the chairs, after a few minutes my sister came out and said, “She is doing really good, don’t worry, the doctor said we can take her back home in three days,” I was happy but couldn’t meet her until the next day and then my sister asked me, “Are you on track with your homework because I have not seen you doing it for a while,” and I replied “We can think about it later,” Those moments of helplessness taught me the importance of time.

I looked in awe at the doctors and nurses and was thankful to god for having someone to help us in times of distress. They were super heroes, their selflessness and dedication inspired me to be someone like them so I can be there to help everyone in times of their distress.

This time, out of my fears and pain, rose an inspiration that gave me the courage to dream. I know now not to sulk in my grief or despair with every hardship. I now have a dream to be a health professional and I am pursuing my goals with a lot of perseverance.  I have consistently grown better and better with my studies. With an aggregate of 67% in 10^th grade, 88% in 11^th and 92% in 12^th grade (that is a rough estimate) I have understood that sky is the limit for a hard working.

Although I am very focused on my goal yet I have kept my possibilities open so as to overcome any hurdles. I have faith in my capabilities and my family is always there to help, I will keep working towards success.

(Word Count-500)

Snap Shot 6 Chase

The game I love. The game I need. What am I holding on to? I'm gripping tightly to my love for hockey. I carry every tradition no matter what. I keep a stick and puck in the back of my car 24/7. I've seen all 3 Mighty Ducks Movie's maybe a hundred times. Miracle still gives me goosebumps when I watch USA finally beat the Soviets. I watched Slapshot too young but man I loved it. If we make the playoffs you can bet on me sporting a mullet. Diving to block shots is a sport in itself for me. I love every part of this beautiful game. Horsing around the airports and hotels, the long and cold bus rides, the suits, the bone crushing hits, the goal horn blaring, and the fans going wild are why I love this game. There is no feeling better in the world than making the move, taking the shot, and watching the puck cross that line. Because that moment of adrenaline is only paired by the uproar of fans that could die happy tonight, because you just scored that game winning goal.

People have bad days, months, and years. It doesn't matter what is going on in my life, I have never played hockey sad. My mind erases. Its like pressing pause in life. One of my favorite things to do in the world is play pond hockey. Back to basics type hockey. My favorite memory ever took place two years ago when I was living in Boston. The family I was placed to stay with, had two kids that loved hockey. They were extremely good and were only 12 and 14 at the time. We would stay up and check the weather for the next day almost every night in the winter. We were waiting for the temperature to drop low enough for long enough so we could play on the lake by the house. It was a friday in mid January and the lake finally froze. I took a snowblower out and cleaned a decent portion to play on. The boys were in school and it didn't feel right if I played by myself so I brought the boys out of the school. We played for hours. The lake was beautiful frozen. It was surrounded by hundreds maybe thousands of trees. I could not have pictured anything better.

"When Hell freezes over, I'll be playing hockey there too."
-Unknown

snapshot 6 by lali lakatos

Ever since I was six years old I always loved to draw, drawing for me helped me escape this world and jump into an whole new world in which I created. At the beginning I just drew for fun and my teachers always said my drawings were unique and especially my coloring because I am colorblind. The day I found out that I was colorblind I was sitting at the kitchen table at my house coloring in a picture and my brother was sitting next to me coloring also and I wanted to paint the ground green in my picture so I looked so hard for a green marker on the table but I couldn't find one so I asked my brother "hey can you give me a green marker" and my brother said "it is right in front of you" so he reached over and picked it up right in front of me. From then on I always asked my brother to pick out the color marker for me, then my parents saw me doing this and they thought their was something wrong with me so they took me to the eye doctor and the test back positive that I am colorblind.  This one time I was coloring the sky purple and I thought it was blue and when I showed my teacher and she said "wow I never thought a sky could be purple" and after that she would always expect something cool in my drawings because she likes seeing how I saw the world. As I grew up my drawings got better and better, in high school my art was hung every time. Between my high school years my drawings started to tell stories and those stories are mostly what is going on in my life. Some stories told happy things like everything was colorful and showed a happy image, but times if I was under stress the colors faded a little and a it showed a image that looked like it was struggling, and in times I was mad there would be no colors mostly just black and showed a dark image. As I continue to draw today I continue to learn new techniques to make whatever I'm drawing become more real and also my color judging got a little better but I think the best drawings of mine are always the unique ones because the color choices I made are different to what other people would have chosen. what I hold onto is my drawings and my drawing techniques if I don't have those I don't know what I would do, I always said to myself  "if I ever lost my right hand I would learn to draw with my left."

Count:456

Snapsot 6: Holding on By: Addison

Having a family at 18 while working two jobs and going to school is the hardest thing I have ever had to do. It becomes overwhelming and I want to give up at times but I have to remember why I am doing it. Trying to keep my relationship together when we have very little time together. I just have to believe that in four years everything will be different. I get discouraged a lot when I get behind in a class or do not have time to do a paper. I do all of this so my son will never go without and my family will stay together. Time is everything, I have to have my whole day planned and have two babysitters in one day a lot since I have school and work. Even on the days I want to give up, I will never give up. If I give up on myself, I will be giving up on my family and not giving them what they deserve. Writing this has been a struggle of keeping an infant happy and not crying. Being a mom is the best thing in my life and the hardest thing in my life but the most rewarding thing in my life. He comes first before anything else. My family is my motivation for everything I am doing. I will never let anyone or anything stop me from failing at what I believe I can accomplish. I have a dream that one day I will not be working two jobs and I will be graduated from college so that way I can see my son way more than what I do now. My son will only be little for a short amount of time and I know I am there as much as possible but I do not want to miss anything. Every second I have I spend it with him so that way I am there for his milestones. With my next child I don’t want to worry about missing their milestones because I had school and work all day. My son has everything he could possibly want and need plus more but I have to struggle to get him everything extra, one day I will not struggle to do that for him and that is what he deserves. I cherish every moment I have with my family and one day I will be able to have another baby and have everything we have ever wanted as a family. I will be able to say one day soon “I made it.”

word count:429

Snapshot 6: Holding On By Josh

Like most people family is my number one priority. My family is my everything. Through my highs and lows in my life it is always my family that support me no matter what and inspire me to be the best I can be. My grandparents are probably the ones that inspire me the most. They’re 80 years old and are both still sharp as a tack. I always love going to their house to see them and talk with them. It’s probably the only thing that can keep me off my phone or any of the other screens I have. Whenever I go up there we all sit around at the dinner table for hours and just talk. Probably the main reason I treasure them the most is because my parents and I aren’t very close to my dad’s side of the family. My dad’s dad died of a heart attack before I was born so I never got to know him. I only see my grandma once a year even though we live 15 minutes from each other. There is some bad blood between my dad and his sister so we never see her and her family. I actually saw them this weekend for the first time in thirteen years and it was one of the most uncomfortable moments of my life because I hardly know them. It’s not that way with my other grandparents and the rest of my mom’s side of the family. we always keep in touch with each other and always know what’s going on with everybody. I dream of one day having a family just like that.

                After graduation a lot was going on. I was finishing up the rest of my track season, hanging out with my friends before we all went our separate ways, and I would eventually start my first semester of college in the fall. Once I college started along I lost touch with my grandparents. I use to try and call them at least once a week or so and it was already the beginning of December and I haven’t talked to them in over two months. While I was hanging out with my friends one night I got a call from my mom. She told me that my grandpa was in the hospital. My heart stopped. I felt terrible because hadn’t heard from him in forever it felt like. I immediately left hanging out with my friends and my mom and I drove up to see him and my grandma. He was admitted into The ProMedica Toledo Hospital. When we got there the doctors told us that everything would be fine. He just had some internal bleeding that was being fixed with antibiotics. We are relieved to hear that he was going to be okay.

My grandparents just turned 80 recently and even though they doing good for their age I know they won’t be around forever. I lost sight of what meant the most to me because I was so caught up in my own life. My grandparents mean a lot to me and I want to be there for them when they get too old and can’t go anymore because that is when they will need their family the most. I owe it to them because they’ve always been there for me. I want to hold on to them for as long as they are still here. I also want to try to clear the bitterness and hatred between my dad and my aunt. After all they’re my family too and I would like to get to know my younger cousin. I know it will be hard to keep up with everything now that my own life is starting but I’m going to do my best for my family.
Word count: 633        

Snapshot 6: Holding On - My Hockey Past and Detroit Red Wings Pride

(792 words)      

        As far as my personal identity and character relating to something I hold onto, it would primarily be my love for the game of ice hockey as well as my pride for the Detroit Red Wings.  It was unfortunately all downhill once I moved to Ohio in May 1997 and later on came to an end when I was 17-18 with my health issues and lack of opportunities in Ohio for ice hockey at the time.

        Growing up in Troy, Michigan, which is about 20 minutes outside of Detroit, the main sport was ice hockey.  I suppose you could compare it to how serious people take Ohio State football here.  I was introduced to hockey through my neighborhood friends, primarily brothers Scott and Eric G., and along with this came my pride, as well as loyalty, for the hometown Detroit Red Wings of the NHL (National Hockey League), which is the professional ice hockey league composed of the world’s best players.

        I would play hockey with my friends whenever I had the chance.  Most of the time it was outside in the driveway on roller-blades and when we had a larger group of people, we would play in the street.  Scott and Eric were always willing to lace up and play hockey until the sun set concluding the day.  Scott and Eric, along with their mother Mrs. G, were absolutely die-hard Detroit Red Wings fans and I thank them for passing on their passion to me.

       When I moved to Ohio, literally almost no one knew what hockey was.  It was terrible. I went from enjoying a sport that was a passion of the entire state of Michigan to a state who thrives on football, which isn’t a bad thing, it just isn’t for me.  Luckily, by the smallest chance, my two friends Brendan and Bobby, who lived down the road, were hockey enthusiasts as well as die-hard Red Wings fans!  Obviously this was completely unexpected, but it was great to find people who shared the same passions as myself.

        As far as my “career” playing ice hockey, that first started in Michigan as well.  I’ll never forget when my parents had to purchase all of the gear. They weren’t too thrilled with the price tag and I wasn’t too thrilled with the used equipment from “Play-It-Again Sports”.  This purchase included used pants, that were in OK shape besides a few tears on the inside, a chest protector that looked like it was from the late 1980’s, along with the shin pads that were pretty musty.  The elbow pads were pretty beat up too.  I wasn’t necessarily disappointed, but it was just a bit strange to be wearing old gear that someone wore out and it was a bit outdated.  I think the only pieces of equipment I had that were new were the ice skates, helmet and gloves.  As I stuck with the sport and sharpened my skills, I obviously earned new and better gear as time went on.  I still have all of my gear at the moment; my hockey bag is in the basement and my three hockey sticks are in my bedroom.

       The feeling of stepping on the ice with razor sharp blades and pressing off, digging the blade into the smooth surface, creating a sound that the only way I can describe would be scraping your windshield clean, but that hardly does anything in comparison to how it actually sounds.  Your feet mold to your ice skates making it feel like your feet are one with the blade.  You feel the cool chill of the air rushing over your face and it intensifies as you pick up speed down the ice.  The feeling of skating backwards as well as crossing-over your skates to cut the angle are both wild sensations as you propel yourself.  All of these sensations are amplified when you are playing opponents and you are performing at your very best, but nothing beats the thrill of scoring a goal and earning a win with your teammates.
   
       My personal pride for the Detroit Red Wings, as well as Detroit, stems back to my time in Michigan, as I stated. The easiest way to spot my pride is when I am wearing a hat; which is frequently, and almost always, one of my Red Wings hats.  I'd say I also have pride form living close to Detroit since it was once a great and powerful city that provided ground-breaking ideas as well as jobs and homes for 1.86 million people at its peak.  I'd love to see the city of Detroit rebuild itself to what it once was, but that is unfortunately a dream as time continues to tick on and the city continues to crumble.