Program encourages ‘gap year’ to prevent school burnout
By: Marjorie Censer
In a town focused on going to college, Holly Bull has a different concern: students not going to college.
As president of the Princeton-based Center for Interim Programs, Ms. Bull helps students take what’s commonly known as a "gap year" or a year between graduating from high school and beginning college.
And while those are her most common participants, her services also are available to adults who want to take time off at any point in life.
While some Princeton residents recently headed off to college, another, Emma Impink, chose another course.
Before graduating from Princeton High School in the spring, Emma realized she was not ready to jump immediately into more schooling.
"I was really burned out," Emma said, responding by e-mail, because she is now working in Alaska. "The prospect of college didn’t excite me, as it’s supposed to; it filled me with dread and anger."
Emma learned from her mother about the Center for Interim Programs, and Ms. Bull helped her design a year that includes time working on construction in Alaska, doing trail work in Redwood National Park in California, caring for orphaned baboons in South Africa and building watering holes for elephants in Namibia. Emma plans to attend Barnard College where she deferred admission in the fall of 2006.
Ms. Bull is more than just an adviser to students like Emma; she’s a role model. In 1980, she graduated from Princeton High School and took a "gap year" that included time in Hawaii and Greece before attending the University of Virginia. Ms. Bull’s father, Cornelius Bull, had founded the Center for Interim Programs that same year.
Today, Ms. Bull interviews and assists students from her Nassau Street office, a room that’s as eclectic as the choices available to students. Clocks line the wall, indicating the time in Melbourne, Paris and New York. Pink, flowery chairs sit on an Oriental rug next to an elephant sculpture. Other worldly artifacts, including a Buddha figure, decorate the room.
Students who use the center pay a flat fee of $1,900 a fee that does not include the cost of travel or the programs. Ms. Bull said she works with roughly 120 students a year. A second office, in Cambridge, Mass., serves about 80 students.
Ms. Bull said her job is not just to tell students what options are available; it’s to make recommendations based on experience.
"We know the duds and we know the good ones," Ms. Bull said.
Sam Coggeshall, a 2004 Princeton High School graduate, turned to Ms. Bull when he was preparing his post-high school plans. He was not sure what he wanted to do, and Ms. Bull helped him set up a trip to New Zealand where he worked on a sheep farm and did other conservation work. Sam has been home in Princeton since April, but will return to New Zealand later this fall and then travel to Costa Rica. He hopes to later attend school at the University of Oregon or the University of California, Santa Cruz.
Sam said his time between high school and college has helped him gain independence.
"The ‘gap year’ made me accept the responsibility of my adulthood," he said. "It helped me figure myself out."
The interim year can also supplement students’ academic programs, Ms. Bull said. Avery Fox, a recent Princeton Day School graduate, is in St. Petersburg, Russia. He said he hopes his experience will help him improve his Russian; he studied the language for four years in high school.
Planning to attend Bard University in 2006, Avery said his parents supported the trip.
"They see it as being just as educational as going to school," he said, also responding by e-mail.
Ms. Bull said immersing oneself in the culture can change the experience of learning a language.
"It’s bringing a language alive," she said. "You take that energy into the classroom."
For Ms. Bull, the responses of students who return from "gap year" programs as well as her own experiences keep her interested in helping students find these options. She calls the interim year an "extraordinary thing to be able to do."
"You get to own your own life," she said. "That is incredibly empowering."