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By Joe Zavala Ashland Daily Tidings November 21. 2014 6:31PM Ashland High School: Students get schooled in interviewing Ashland High School juniors meet with volunteer interviewers during a mock interview process intended to teach them real-life skills. photo by Larry Stauth, Jr. As a catcher for the Ashland High baseball team, Jett Hamik has plenty of experience performing under pressure. Likely, more experience than most of his peers. But on Thursday in the Ashland High commons, Hamik was confronted with another form of anxiety, one that in some ways makes blocking the plate with the go-ahead run at third base seem like child’s play in comparison. He endured his first job interview. It wasn’t a real interview and there was no real job. But to Hamik, it was real enough. “It was a little nerve-racking,” he said. “I’m just thinking, ‘What can I say that’s going to make me seem the most … personable, I guess? Make it look like I know what I’m doing? I had sentences in my head that I knew I was already going to say, weaknesses and strengths and all that kind of stuff.” Every junior at Ashland High, like Hamik, went through a mock interview this week — half the class on Tuesday, the other half Thursday — culminating a mostly volunteer-run program in its third year whose goal is to prepare the students for the real thing. It’s a three-tier process. First, the students sit through a presentation by a local expert — this year Tanya Haakinsno, a human resources and safety manager from SierraPine, did the honors — who coaches them up on techniques and strategies to nail a job and/or college interview (students chose which they want to practice).  Then, the students are put to the test in the commons, each in a one-on-one setting for 15 minutes at a small table. Next week, they’ll go over evaluation forms filled out by the interviewers. The interviewers, all volunteers gathered through a mass email sent out by AHS volunteer coordinator Diane Mathews, are handed a “questions and feedback” form a few minutes before the mock interviews begin, but they aren’t required to stick to the script. In fact, as AHS guidance counselor Steve Smith told them during a brief tutorial Thursday morning, sometimes it’s better not to. “As you’re talking to the student, just kind of see how it goes, just go with the flow,” he said. “When I was meeting with my student Tuesday, I didn’t even follow the script. I was just interested. He just started going on about what his dreams were, his plans in college and he was prepared to talk, so I just kind of let him go with the flow.” Moments later about 50 anxious-looking students — some dressed in slacks and button-up shirts, some in sweatshirts and ball caps — filed into the commons through the double doors and were told it was time to begin the interviews, which meant it was time to walk into a room jam-packed with ready-and-waiting volunteers and, by way of a firm handshake, select one. That provided lesson No. 1: interviews, both real and mock, can be awkward, at first. “The lady I had was really, really nice — I chose her because she looked nice,” said Jordyn Myers, 16. “It was pretty nerve-racking because I haven’t really experienced anything like this, but I think it was a good experience for me. Now if I do want to get a job that way, I know what to do in an interview.” For some of the students, Thursday’s session served as an elaborate review. Ewan McCarthy, 16, who interviewed for a job as a ranch hand last summer (he was hired), said Thursday’s mock interview was very similar to the real one he already experienced. He felt it was still helpful. “For them to do this for us is awesome,” he said. “It does give good experience. They asked me exactly what my job asked me pretty much — my strengths, weaknesses, conflict and how I handled it. It was five topics and it was very easy — I answered confidently and fluently, and she told me I did a good job.” Not all the students were as confident and open as McCarthy, and Smith told the interviewers to be prepared for a wide range of personalities. The volunteers could also lean on their script, which included the five talking points McCarthy alluded to: What are your strengths? What are your weaknesses? Name an accomplishment of which you are most proud. Describe a conflict you experienced and how you handled it. Why do you want to work or go to college here? The form also included three additional questions and invited interviewers to improvise a few of their own: What are three words that best describe you? Name a time when you learned something new. How did you go about learning it? Describe a time when you had to work as a member of a team. What role did you play? At the bottom of each form there’s a space for the judges to grade the students on eye contact, confidence/fluency, authenticity and believability and overall impression. Interviewers are also asked whether they got to know the student. That doesn’t always happen. “He was very closed off,” volunteer Jennifer Nidalmia said of one of her subjects (each volunteer interviews two students in 30 minutes). Part of the challenge, Nidalmia said, was navigating through the icy first few minutes in order to get deeper. “My first one, he didn’t want to say anything at first, and then once I started asking questions and got deeper into his personal life experience he really opened up and I could tell he’s going to be an amazing adult going into this interviewing world,” she said. “My idea was just to get to know them, but also try to challenge them with some really direct questions and see what their response was. You kind of blend some of the questions and it’s really easy to jump off. Both of mine played school sports, so then I started asking them how do they see themselves on the team, how are their team skills going to apply to their job, stuff like that.” The program began when Mathews’ predecessor, Margaret Brownlie, asked AHS principal Michelle Zundel to name the single most important program that she would like to implement but hadn’t been able to because she didn’t think she could get enough volunteers. Zundel’s answer was one-on-one mock interviews. Brownlie then took it upon herself to gather enough volunteers to hold the school’s first mock interview session in the spring of 2012, and AHS has continued the program every fall since with one key tweak – juniors are now interviewed instead of seniors. The program matched Zundel’s vision for the ideal AHS graduate, one who’s equipped with “the knowledge and skills they need to be successful.” It’s making a difference, says AHS teacher and advisory coordinator Allison French, who will lead the students through their evaluations next week. “They’re teenagers,” French says, “so sometimes their first instinct is to grumble. But (last year) they all came back on fire, excited about what had happened, that somebody else had seen them interview. To have somebody sit across the table and see them is important. It’s not that they are beaten down, because it doesn’t seem like it’s impossible to change. And the kids are motivated to do that when they come back.” Joe Zavala is a reporter for the Ashland Daily Tidings. Reach him at 541-821-0829 or [email protected].  http://www.dailytidings.com/article/20141121/NEWS/141129940 © 2015 Copyright © 1995-2011 Crain Communications Inc. All Rights Reserved. Terms of Use Privacy Statement -->