Questions to Ask for the Yearbook
Questions to ask for the yearbook when you are the one holding the notebook: essentials for any student, then time capsule sidebars, club and team pages and a look back at the year. The questions to ask seniors for the yearbook take in the senior will, a superlative and the ten-year reunion, and the yearbook questions to ask teachers are meant for the coaches, the front office and the bus garage as well. The staples are here, the favorite memory, the three words, the advice for a first day, along with questions that ask for one place, one small tradition or a caption in the student's own words. The guide covers running the interview and what to confirm before you walk away.
Want questions from the whole vault instead? Try the random question generator.
The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Essentials
What one memory from this school year do you most want in the yearbook?
Why ask it
Asking for one makes them pick a scene instead of summing up the year, and a scene is what a caption needs. If the answer is as broad as homecoming, ask which five minutes of it. Their pick also tells you which spread they belong on.
What three words sum up this school year for you?
Why ask it
Fast enough to ask in a hallway, and a page of answers from different grades makes a sidebar with no more reporting. When one of the three words is strange, ask why that one, because the reason is the quote.
What will you actually miss, not the thing you are supposed to say you will miss?
Why ask it
The framing gives them permission to skip the expected answer about friends and Friday nights. The specific answers, a hallway smell, a certain bell, are the ones people reread.
What would you tell someone on their first day here?
Why ask it
Ask for advice to one person rather than to a whole grade and you get something concrete, like which door to use, instead of "be yourself." Push back gently on any answer that sounds like a poster.
Which class did you look forward to most this year, and what did the teacher do that made it that way?
Why ask it
The class name on its own is a poll result. What the teacher did is the quote, so wait for something you could photograph: a Friday ritual, a lab that went wrong, a joke hidden on every test.
If we came looking for you on a normal school day, where would we find you?
Why ask it
The answer is a real place, the band room, the loading dock, the third table by the window, and a photographer can go and shoot it. Ask what time of day as well, so you turn up when they are there.
What is something most people at this school do not know about you?
Why ask it
Hidden talents come out here: the linebacker who bakes, the quiet sophomore who rebuilds bikes, the junior who speaks three languages at home. Remind them it is going into print, so they offer something they are glad to have known, and ask whether there is a photo to go with it.
What is the inside joke your friend group will still be quoting in ten years?
Why ask it
A nervous interviewee loosens up quickly when the first thing on the record is a laugh. Have them tell you where the joke started, because the origin is what lets a reader outside the group in on it.
What are you most looking forward to next year?
Why ask it
Built for the students who are coming back, who get left out when every closing question is about leaving. A sixth grader might say lockers and a junior the senior parking lot, and a column of answers by grade shows the whole ladder.
In your own words, what sentence do you want printed under your photo?
Why ask it
The caption now belongs to the person it describes, and your staff is spared inventing one at deadline. Take it down as they say it and read it back word for word. If your school has rules for senior quotes, they apply here too, so ask your adviser what they are.
Who should we interview next, and what should we ask them?
Why ask it
Every interview should hand you the next two, which is how you reach students outside your own circle. The suggested question is often better than anything on your list.
Time Capsule
If this year had one song on the soundtrack, which is it and which part of the year does it match?
Why ask it
A title by itself is a playlist entry. Tied to the weight room in January or the bus home from the state meet, it becomes a memory other people share. Print the title and the artist, not the lyrics, and let your adviser see the list before it runs.
What was everyone here wearing this year that will look dated by your reunion?
Why ask it
Trends are invisible while you are inside them, so asking for the future embarrassment is what gets them named. Collect answers from every grade, because ninth graders and seniors rarely point at the same thing.
Which show, movie or video did everybody seem to be talking about this year?
Why ask it
A favorites poll fills a sidebar quickly, and this wording asks what the whole building watched instead of one person's taste. Tally it by grade. When a title you have never heard of keeps coming up, ask who started passing it around.
Which word or phrase did you say far too often this year?
Why ask it
Slang dates a yearbook faster than anything else in it, which is the reason to print it. Have them use it in a sentence, and run it past your adviser if you are not certain what it means.
Which app or game took up most of your screen time this year?
Why ask it
If they offer to check the phone's own weekly report, take the number, since a real figure is funnier in print than "too much." In a decade the name of the app alone will place the year for anyone who was there.
What did you eat for lunch most days, and where did you eat it?
Why ask it
Ordinary enough that nobody thinks to record it, so it is one of the first things a class forgets. The second half often maps the building better than a floor plan does: a stairwell, a teacher's room, a car in the lot.
What is in your backpack right now that says the most about your year?
Why ask it
Let them look in the bag instead of answering from memory, and let them choose what comes out. A dead calculator, a script with notes in the margin or a crumpled permission slip gives the photographer a detail shot and gives you the caption for it.
Which teacher's saying could your whole class finish from memory?
Why ask it
A catchphrase belongs to everyone who sat in that room, and it costs almost no space to print. Take the line to the teacher before it runs. Most are delighted, and the few who are not should get the choice.
Which school event this year turned out better than you expected?
Why ask it
The dance and the big game get their spreads regardless. This one turns up the trivia night or the rained-out field day that surprised people, and a surprise usually arrives as a story with a beginning and an end.
What was the loudest this school got all year, and what caused it?
Why ask it
You are asking for a sound, so you get a moment: the buzzer shot, the fire drill in the middle of finals, the assembly where the principal lost a bet. Keep count of how many people name the same one, because that is your measure of which event has earned the bigger spread.
What happened at this school this year for the first time?
Why ask it
A new wing, a first playoff win, a changed schedule or a phone rule is the news of the year, and students name it faster than the official calendar does. Check any claim of a first with someone who has been in the building a long time.
What do you hope someone opening this book in twenty years understands about what it was like to be here right now?
Why ask it
Here the student is talking to the person a yearbook is really for, the one who opens it long afterward. Answers reach past the building to prices, phones, the town and the news, which the rest of the book leaves out. Give it time, since nobody has this one ready.
Clubs and Teams
Which club, team, or job took up most of your time?
Why ask it
This catches the students whose main commitment happens off campus, at a paid job or caring for a sibling, and who rarely appear on an activities page. Ask how many hours a week, and the answer often startles both of you.
What got you to sign up, and is that still the reason you show up?
Why ask it
People rarely stay for the reason they joined. A friend dragged them to the first meeting or they wanted the jacket, and the distance between the two answers is the story of their time in the group.
What is the smallest tradition in your group that an outsider would never understand?
Why ask it
Small rituals, the pregame playlist, the same gas station stop on every away trip, are what a team page built from scores leaves out. Ask who started it and whether that person has graduated, which tells you how old the tradition is.
What happens at practice or rehearsal that people who only come to the main event would never guess?
Why ask it
Game days and opening nights already have photographs. The Tuesday run-through is where the work is, so ask for one drill, warm-up or running argument, and send a photographer to the next one.
Which game, show or competition from this year will the group still be arguing about next year?
Why ask it
Asking for the one they argue about, not the one they won, brings out the overtime loss and the judge's score nobody accepted. Get the date and the opponent or venue so the result can be checked against the record.
What was said on the bus, in the huddle or in the wings that you still remember?
Why ask it
A line somebody actually said beats any summary of how the season felt. Find out who said it and go to that person too, both to confirm the wording and to hear whether they mind seeing it in print.
What did this year's new members bring that the group did not have before?
Why ask it
Team pages lean on seniors, and this hands an older student the job of naming a freshman or a transfer. Then go and interview the person they named.
What is the funniest thing that fell apart this year and worked out fine anyway?
Why ask it
A missed cue or a bus that drove to the wrong school gets told in more detail than any win, because everyone who was there remembers their own part in it. Check that the person at the center of the story is laughing too before it runs.
What would you say to someone who is thinking about joining next year?
Why ask it
A club page is read by next year's possible members as well as this year's. Ask what the first week is like, what to bring and how much time it really takes, so the answer is more than "just do it." Captains tend to have a speech ready, so put the same question to a first-year member.
Looking Back
What did you get noticeably better at this year that nobody noticed?
Why ask it
Quiet students who think they have no news can usually answer this one: a faster mile, a cleaner weld, finally speaking up in Spanish. Ask whether there is somewhere you could watch them do it, which turns the quote into a photo.
What is the hardest thing you pulled off this year?
Why ask it
Asking for a proudest accomplishment invites modesty and a shrug, while "hardest" gets a story with an obstacle in it. If they name something small, ask why it was hard, and the answer stops being small.
What did you believe about this place as a freshman that turned out to be completely wrong?
Why ask it
The punchline is built in, so the reflection comes out funny instead of heavy: the pool on the roof, the teacher everyone was told to fear. Next year's new students will read these for reassurance, so collect more than you think you need.
How are you different from the person in last year's yearbook photo?
Why ask it
Bring last year's book and open it to their page, because the photo does half the asking. Hair and height come first. Wait for the second answer, which is more likely to be about who they sit with now or what they stopped worrying about.
What is one risk you took here that you would tell a nervous younger student to take too?
Why ask it
Advice arrives as a story here, because they have to name what they did: the audition, the lunch table they walked up to, the class a friend warned them off. Ask what nearly stopped them.
What is the most embarrassing thing that happened to you this year that you can laugh about now?
Why ask it
"That you can laugh about now" steers them to a story they already tell, which is the only kind to print. Run it only when the teller is the one embarrassed. If anyone else is the punchline, that person has to agree before it goes near a page.
Which teacher, coach, or staff member deserves credit they never got, and for what?
Why ask it
Often the name is a custodian, an aide or a bus driver who has never been on a faculty page. Get the spelling on the spot, since these are the names nobody on your staff can check from memory, then go and tell that person what was said about them.
Who got you through this year, at school or away from it?
Why ask it
Leave the door open to home and you hear about the grandmother who drove them every morning or the manager who moved shifts around exam week. Before it runs, ask whether that person would want their name in a school book.
What is your favorite thing about this school that a visitor would never notice?
Why ask it
"Favorite thing about this school" on its own gets "my friends" from nearly everyone. Adding the visitor asks for what only an insider knows: the bench by the gym that gets the sun at lunch, the librarian who learns every name. Set these beside the answers to the next question.
What is one thing you would change about this school?
Why ask it
Expect complaints about lunch and parking, which are fine and true. Decide in advance with your adviser how much criticism the book will print, so you are not editing a student's words after promising to run them.
Seniors
What are you doing after graduation, and how do you feel about it?
Why ask it
The second half is the part that reads honestly, because plenty of students are more nervous than excited. A senior who is still waiting on a decision, or has not settled on anything, should be able to say so, and nothing should be printed as certain that is not.
Where do you want to be at your ten-year reunion?
Why ask it
Answers like this tend to get read back at the reunion itself, so ask for something that can be checked: a city, a job, a dog, the same car still running. Keep it light enough that a student with no plan can answer with a joke and not feel behind.
What did you want to be in kindergarten, and what do you want to be now?
Why ask it
The distance between the two answers is the charm: the dinosaur doctor who now wants to be a nurse, or the rare student whose answer never changed. It makes a ready caption if your book runs childhood photos beside senior portraits. In an elementary school book, ask only the second half.
What is still on your list to do here before graduation?
Why ask it
Asked early in the year, this gives your staff a calendar of things to photograph as they happen. Asked in the final weeks it gets a wistful answer, which is a different quote and also worth having.
Which senior tradition was worth the wait?
Why ask it
Most schools keep a few things for seniors alone, a parking lot, a sunrise, a painted wall, and younger students read those pages to see what is coming. If the answer is that none of it matched the talk, that is printable too, as long as it is said about an event and not about a person.
Which friendship from here do you expect to still have at thirty, and how did it start?
Why ask it
The prediction is sweet, but the origin is the part to print: an assigned seat in sixth grade, a shared bus stop. Interview the friend separately and set the two versions of the story side by side.
If you could leave one thing to next year's seniors, what would it be and who gets it?
Why ask it
This is the senior will in one line: a parking spot, a locker, the back row of the bus, left to a named underclassman. Read each one for a dig hiding inside the joke, and cut any the person receiving it would not laugh at.
Which superlative would your friends vote you for, and which one would you rather win?
Why ask it
The gap between the two answers says more than an official vote does. It also gives a line to the seniors who will not win a category, which is nearly all of them.
What do you want your classmates to remember about you?
Why ask it
Save it for the end, once they have relaxed. The first answer is usually a joke, so stay quiet a moment longer and the second one is the quote.
Teachers and Staff
What brought you to this school, and what has kept you here?
Why ask it
Long-serving staff have usually been asked the first half and rarely the second. Get the year they started and the subject or job they started in, and confirm both, because faculty pages get proofread hardest by the people on them.
What were you like at the age of the students you work with now?
Why ask it
Students go looking for these answers on a faculty page before they read anything else there. Ask whether they have a school photo of their own that they would lend you to run beside the quote.
Which object in your room has a story that students have never heard?
Why ask it
An object gives a reserved adult something to talk about other than themselves, and it gives the photographer a picture that is not a posed portrait. Point at the mug or the faded poster if they hesitate, and ask how long it has been there.
What happens in your job before the first bell or after the last one?
Why ask it
Take this one to the front office, the kitchen, the custodial crew and the bus garage as well as the classroom. What you hear is the part of the job students are never around for, so ask whether you could come back at that hour with a camera.
What did this year's students do that you had not seen a class do before?
Why ask it
It asks for an observation, so you get something more exact than "they were a great group." If the first answer is general, ask which period or which afternoon they have in mind.
What is the best excuse you heard this year?
Why ask it
Most teachers have one saved up and are glad to hand it over, so it suits the staff member who insists they have nothing interesting to tell you. Leave the student's name out, even when the teacher offers it. A handful from different departments fills a sidebar.
If you were not working at a school, what job would you have?
Why ask it
A staple of faculty pages because the answers are short and nothing alike: a park ranger, a line cook, a radio host. Ask whether they ever did it for a living, because a teacher with a first career has the longer story.
What did your own senior yearbook say about you?
Why ask it
Quote, superlative, list of clubs or the haircut: let them pick what to admit to. Some teachers still have the book at home and will bring it in, and an old page set beside this year's lets students compare the two.
What do students assume about your job that is not true?
Why ask it
Expect the myth that teachers live in the building or do nothing all summer, and expect the correction to be funny. Put it to the nurse, the counselor and the librarian too, whose work students see only a corner of.
Which day on the school calendar do you look forward to every year?
Why ask it
It might be a lab, a field trip, the first morning back or the afternoon the grades are finally in. Write down the date if it has not happened yet, so a photographer can be in the room when it does.
What did a student teach you this year?
Why ask it
The usual direction is reversed, and the answers range from a phone shortcut to a way of explaining fractions the teacher now uses. Find out whether the student knows, and whether they are happy to be named, before either goes on the page.
What do you hope students still remember from your room ten years from now?
Why ask it
Expect something other than the curriculum: a habit, a rule about how people get treated, a running joke. With a teacher who is retiring, ask it last and give the answer room on the page.
What would you say to this year's graduating class?
Why ask it
Asked cold, this produces a commencement speech. Ask for one sentence, or for the thing they wish someone had told them at that age, and you get a line short enough to print beside their photo. The class adviser and the coaches who have known these students longest are the ones to ask.
How to Run a Yearbook Interview That Produces Printable Quotes
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Best Practices
Chase the Noun, Not the Feeling
When someone says the season was amazing, ask which game, which quarter, who was standing next to them. A caption needs a place, a name, and a time. Keep asking "what did that look like" until you have all three.
Record If You May, Then Read It Back
Rules on phones and on recording people differ from school to school, so ask your adviser how it works at yours. Where recording is allowed and the person agrees, record so you can quote them exactly. Where it is not, write the line down as they say it. Either way, read the sentence you plan to print back to them before you leave. Thirty seconds of read-back catches the misheard word while it can still be fixed.
Confirm Spelling and Details on the Spot
Get the spelling of their full name, their grade, their jersey number, and the spelling of every other name they mention. A name misspelled in a yearbook stays misspelled, and six weeks later nobody remembers who said what.
Interview Beyond Your Own Table
A staff left to itself quotes the students it already knows. Build a checklist of groups, the trades program, the English learner classes, the bowling team, the night custodians, and mark them off, so the book reflects the whole building.
Ask Two-Part Questions in Two Parts
Many questions on this list have a second half. Ask the first half, wait for the whole answer, then ask the second, because both halves asked in one breath get an answer to only one. Then stay quiet. The pause after they think they are finished is often where the printable sentence is.
Ask the Short Ones in Bulk
The time capsule questions earn their space when many people answer the same one. Take a single question to a whole lunch table or homeroom and write a name and grade beside every answer. One student's lunch order is trivia. A column of them from every grade is a record of the year.
Adapt the List for Younger Grades
For a middle or elementary school book, swap freshman for the first grade your school has, leave out the questions about plans after graduation, and lean on the essentials and the time capsule. Keep "what do you want to be" and "what are you looking forward to next year," which the youngest students answer happily. They also answer better with a place or an object in front of them, so interview at the cubby, the lunch table or the playground.
Question Sequences
The Senior Spread (five minutes)
- 1The one memory from this year they most want in the book
- 2What they believed as a freshman that turned out to be wrong
- 3What they will actually miss, not what they are supposed to miss
- 4What they wanted to be in kindergarten, and what they want to be now
- 5The sentence they want printed under their photo, in their words
The Club or Team Page
- 1What got them to sign up, and whether that is still why they show up
- 2The smallest tradition an outsider would not understand
- 3The funniest thing that fell apart and worked out anyway
- 4What they would say to someone thinking about joining
- 5Who to interview next, and what to ask them
The Teacher and Staff Feature
- 1What brought them to this school, and what has kept them
- 2The object in their room with a story students have never heard
- 3What their job involves before the first bell or after the last one
- 4The best excuse they heard this year
- 5What they would say to the graduating class, in one sentence
The Underclassman Voice
- 1The class they looked forward to, and what the teacher did
- 2The loudest this school got all year, and what caused it
- 3How they differ from the person in last year's yearbook photo
- 4What they are most looking forward to next year
The Time Capsule Sidebar
- 1Three words for this school year
- 2The word or phrase they said far too often
- 3The show, movie or video everybody was talking about
- 4Lunch most days, and where they ate it
- 5The song on the year's soundtrack, and the part of the year it matches
Common Pitfalls
Do Not Print an Inside Joke You Cannot Explain
A nickname or catchphrase that is funny at the lunch table can read as mocking in nine point type next to someone's face. If you cannot explain in one sentence why it is affectionate, cut it or ask the person it is about.
Do Not Name Someone Who Has Not Seen the Line
Senior wills, superlatives, embarrassing stories and teacher catchphrases all point at a person who was not in the interview. Show that person the line before layout, and treat a hesitant yes as a no.
Do Not Guess at What Your School Will Print
Schools differ on whether a student's name can run beside a photo, which families have asked to be left out, and what a senior quote may say. Your adviser knows how it works at yours. Ask before the first interview, not when the proofs come back.
Do Not Promise Every Quote Will Run
Space collapses at deadline and students remember being told they would be in the book. Say that you are gathering more than you can print and that you will let them know where they landed.
Do Not Push on the Hard Answer
Asking who got someone through the year, or what the hardest thing they pulled off was, can open something real: an illness, a loss, trouble at home. Let them decide how much to say, offer to keep it off the record, and never print a personal detail a student has not explicitly approved. If what you hear leaves you worried about them, take it to your adviser, not to the page.
Do Not Trust Your Memory on Facts
Scores, records, dates and titles are easy to get wrong from memory, yours or theirs. Check every number against a schedule, roster or program before it goes to the printer.
Do Not Leave Every Interview for the Final Deadline
Quotes gathered months after a season ends come out generic, because the details have faded. Interview within a week or two of the event, while people still remember what was said on the bus.
Get This Before You Walk Away
- Full name spelled out loud, letter by letter, plus a preferred name if they use one
- Grade level, and graduation year for seniors
- Every other person, club, and event name they mentioned, spelled
- Their yes to printing the quote, and a note if any part was off the record
- Their pick for the sentence under their photo, written exactly as they said it
- A contact, phone or school email, for one follow up question at layout
- A photo lead: the place or activity where you should shoot them
- The date of the interview and your own name on the notes file