Write an article about yourself, written in third person. It needs to be in a positive tone, describing any obstacles or hurdles you’ve overcome and accomplishments you’ve achieved. Pretend it will be published on the front page of the Sunday L.A. Times. What do you want the world to know about you? No obstacle, hurdle, or accomplishment is too small.

Every year, the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers host a national competition, called Extreme Engineering, at their yearly conference. In 2012, Candelaria Flores, an engineering community college student was encouraged by her fellow peers to participate in this 24 hour, no sleep, competition against 300 University students. Candelaria saw this as an opportunity to gain leadership experience by being in a team of big companies like the NAVY, Raytheon, Boeing, NASA etc. She had no previous formal interview experience, she wasn’t prepared and didn’t know how to behave well under pressure. During the first stage of the competition, students are interviewed by 10 top notch engineering companies. Candelaria, was very nervous as she chose to have her first interview with the NAVY. The long lines of competitive University students became intimidating and soon enough it was her turn to experience the initial threshold of Extreme Engineering. Candelaria greeted the sergeant with a nervous handshake, sat down on the chair across the booth from him, and the sergeant asked, “Why should I pick you out of everyone in this room? What makes you special?”. Candelaria froze. What made her stand out from all the University students when she was only in community college? She couldn’t answer the question. She apologized to the sergeant for not being able to answer the questions, and left the room in tears and discouraged from becoming an engineer. After she spoke to her advisor Brian Vazquez, he took initiative to helping her and her peers who were interested in attending the next conference and prepared them well for interviews and professional presentation. In 2013, the yearly conference was approaching rapidly and everyone began speaking about Extreme Engineering. As Candelaria prepared for the interview, she began to gain confidence in answering questions, and practiced a firm handshake with eye to eye contact. On the day of the first stage of the competition she had unpleasant flashbacks from the last year’s interview but she stayed strong and managed to once again be interviewed by the NAVY first. It was Candelaria’s turn to be interviewed. The sergeant asked questions about her leadership, and how she prepared. She answered with confidence and less nervousness. “TIME’S UP!” said the time keeper after 3 minutes of being interviewed. She firmly shook the sergeant’s hand and thanked him for the interview. She passed her first interview! She felt good about continuing onto the next booth and chose Raytheon. Raytheon asked Candelaria to draw a picture using a pig, fork and a car and to tell the interviewer a story. She drew a formula 1 vehicle, with a fork as the antenna, and the pig as the sponsor. As she told the story she brought her picture to life. The Raytheon interviewer asked her, “How did you prepare for this interview? Do you have a laptop?” After answering the interviewer’s questions he asked her the ultimate question, “If we choose you, will we win first place?” of course she must reply “yes!”. She shook the interviewers hand and made her way to getting the last interview to qualify for the next stage of the competition. After the first stage ended every student returned to a large room where companies announced who would be in their team for the rest of the competition. One after another, the competitive students were being called to be a part of the NAVY, and NASA. Candelaria had not heard her name yet. Raytheon was next, students being called and she still didn’t hear name. Raytheon needed one more student, when they finally said “Candelaria Flores”. She had redeemed herself! Hard work and motivation led her into one of the strongest team and elite competition. Her devotion to getting back up when she had failed inspired her for success and as a team Raytheon won 1^st place.