Ben Kosinski

Ed. note: The Enterprise publishes “Catch a Rising Star” to recognize students who stand out among their peers academically, athletically, artistically or in their attitudes. Students from Glen Lake, Lake Leelanau St. Mary, Leland, Northport, Suttons Bay and those living in Leelanau but attending Traverse City West High School will be featured. Catch a Rising Star is compiled by news editor Amy Hubbell and is published twice a month during the school year.

Ben Kosinski, son of Richard Kosinski and Deborah Och of Bingham Township and a senior at Traverse City West High School, is this week’s “Rising Star.” He was nominated by Traverse City West assistant principal Konrad Molter.

“Ben is purely a class act. He is always ready to help and his success as a student does not measure up to his character,” Molter said.

Ben is a member of the Key Club and National Honor Society. He has applied for admission to Stanford and Cornell and has been accepted at the University of Michigan.

Ben enjoys wakeboarding and snowboarding and has a younger brother, Sam, who is in 10th grade.

Favorite Class: Advanced Placement chemistry. “It’s interesting and challenging.”

Do you have a role model: No.

Career plans: “Pursue a bachelor’s degree electrical or biomedical engineering and afterward pursue a post-graduate degree in that field or apply for admission to medical school.”

Favorite place to hang out: “I really don’t have any one spot. It depends on the season. In the summer it would be the golf course or on the water; in the winter, snowboarding.”

Describe your perfect day — who would you spend it with, what would you do, where would you be? In the summer, I’d get up at 8 or 9 and spend the whole day (until 10:30 p.m.) on the boat on an inland lake. Last year, it was Duck Lake (near Grawn) and Cedar Lake (near Greilickville). It would be calm and we’d spend the entire day wakeboarding, coming in only to eat. In the winter, I would be staying at a hotel at a Rocky Mountain resort. There’d be a snowstorm and a foot of new powder to ride all day with my friends.”

What’s the best book you’ve ever read? “I really don’t read that much for pleasure … If I had to say one book it would have to be A Prayer for Owen Meany.”

Favorite musician/musical group? “Dispatch. They play relaxed alternative rock.”