Well-traveled Princeton High School grad isn’t going very far to find an alma mater
By: Pat Summers
"At the beginning," says Jane Dobkin (Princeton High School ’06), "I thought, there’s no way I’m going to Princeton University. I’ve grown up in Princeton and I want to go out and experience a different place. I want to see the world."
And then, "I applied. I thought ‘going to Princeton wouldn’t be that bad. It is, like, the best university in the country,’ and you can do anything you want with a Princeton degree."
Finally, after her stay on campus in April, when she was shown around by a host student and attended classes, she concluded, "It seemed right. It seems like the perfect place."
Between her high school graduation Thursday and orientation activities at the university in September, Jane Dobkin, Princeton University Class of ’10, will have two months to prepare for her move across town and into a unique kind of home schooling.
Besides trading the high school’s blue and white for the university’s orange and black and moving up from the PHS "little tigers" to the Princeton tigers, she’ll leave her lifetime home for campus housing.
Talking with others has given Jane a realistic perspective toward living on campus in her home town. She has learned "You can make living at the university as far away from home as you want to. It’s also as close as you want it to be. So you win in both ways.
"If you have to go home and get, like, a car, you can. If you want to have nothing to do with your parents, you can do that, too," she adds. But Jane already anticipates re-joining her family for holidays and winter break and for their annual team effort in the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation’s "Race for the Cure." Later this summer, in fact, the family will travel to Greece and Kenya.
That old song’s "far away places with strange sounding names" is actually one Jane could sing along to. She loves traveling and has done quite a bit of it. When she was 12, she lived for six months in Israel, attending the American International School there and visiting Egypt, as well.
With her high school choir, she has visited Dresden and Prague, Vienna and Budapest. Beyond the music stops in Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria and Hungary, she’s also been to England, Spain, Italy and Greece.
For the last few summers, Jane has enjoyed a variety of out-of-state experiences. Last summer it was Alaska for three weeks of community service projects; before 11th grade, she was part of a summer studies program at Brown University, before 10th grade, she was off to Smith College for a summer science and engineering program.
Jane’s father, David D. Dobkin, is a computer science professor at Princeton, and now dean of the faculty. Suzanne Gespass, her mother, is a prof in Rider University’s department of teacher training. Her older sister, Sarah, graduated from Princeton earlier this month, while Ben, 12, attends the John Witherspoon School.
Jane had asked Sarah if her dad’s working at Princeton had made any difference, and was comforted to learn that any relationship references were made discreetly, not in front of other students. Though she’s not sure she’ll take computer science courses at the university, she’s eager for "interactive" classes like those she sat in on. Right now, her academic interests range from bio-med to architecture.
Moving to a new school, even in the same town, can sometimes spur life or style changes. "I’ve kinda let things come to me," Jane says now. "I definitely want to reach out more and grab all the opportunities I can get. That’s a really important part of being at Princeton it offers so much."
She already knows she likes the university’s precept system, with large lecture classes broken down into smaller sections. This facilitates acquaintance with profs, something that’s important to Jane. Thinking back to high school classes, she remembers how teachers made a decided difference in how she felt about the courses she took.
Princeton’s residential college system also appeals to her. Each floor’s "RA," or resident assistant, means upper-class help is there for the asking.
Nor will all her new classmates be strangers to Jane. She knows others from the high school who will also start at Princeton in September, and she figures that she and a good friend who was also accepted will know how to balance old and new acquaintances.
This year, said Jeff Lowe, Princeton High’s college adviser, the "usual large number of PHS students will move on to the university." Describing Jane as "a fantastic student who earned her admission," he says she was one of the top five academically and in extracurricular areas.
One part of Jane’s M.O., according to Mr. Lowe, is being "shyly self-deprecating." For that reason, he, not she, first mentioned her receiving the high school’s Gold Key award for service. "She wants to do more in the world," he says, adding, "Literally, she’d help anyone." In existence since 1947, this award has also gone to the likes of distinguished alumnus John Lithgow, the actor.
Wholly in character, Jane (who is a slender 5’6," with long brown hair and distinguished eyebrows) says of her study habits, "I procrastinate, but I get everything done. I work it out."
Both an instrumental and vocal musician, Jane has studied flute for six years, starting with "just knowing" she wanted to play it. Although she listens to all kinds of music, starting with pop and alternative, she plays mostly classical. A band and orchestra member, she also played trombone for a year. She sang soprano in an a cappella group and the school choir.
With another girl, she served as a senior class rep to the school board. Before then, "I never really thought about how to run a school," she says. They reported each month, usually on the music both were so involved in. As a member of the model United Nations, Jane attended conferences at Georgetown and Princeton universities.
Certified in CPR, Jane is also a lifeguard. She had swum on her middle school team but then, because she "always wanted to be a lifeguard," signed up for Rider University’s course. She can read and write Hebrew, speaking "a little," and she has also studied Spanish, one of the many AP courses to her credit.
Reviewing Jane Dobkin’s academic and co-curricular record, which might give pause to the most indefatigable, maybe it’s about time for her to settle down in one place for a while. To her, Princeton University looks just right.
Besides, the sign that she’d pick Princeton was there all along: "Orange has been my favorite color for quite some time."