Taking Notes

William Roufberg relishes his role in the classroom

By Kristin Boyd
   GO ahead, call William Roufberg an ethical egghead.
   The 83-year-old won’t get offended; in fact, he’d likely take the name calling as a compliment, then use his biggest muscle — his brain — to knock you down to size.
   With spring semester now underway, Mr. Roufberg of Kendall Park is again in his element — the classroom. A retired Princeton High School history teacher, he teaches courses at Rutgers University, senior centers and nursing homes.
   ”I’m a people person. I’m comfortable with anyone and everyone. I’m never nervous, and I’m fascinated by people,” he says. “I’m happy I went into teaching. It’s a very important profession. It’s a labor of love.”
   Many have tried, but sparring 10 rounds in a philosophical debate or discussing some of history’s pivotal moments with Mr. Roufberg is a losing battle. He still hears interesting “war” stories from former students, who he occasionally sees at McCarter Theatre and Theatre Intime, two of his favorite places in Princeton.
   ”I hope I taught students the respect for people,” he says. “You don’t have to agree with what people believe or accept it, but try to understand it and see their point of view.”
   Even Mr. Roufberg’s hobbies are based in his continual thirst for knowledge and his longing to understand people. He attends classes through the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Rutgers University, which offers stimulating, noncredit courses like French Impressionism and Movies of Social Significance for residents ages 50 and older. And forget golf; he’d rather travel to exotic locales like Hawaii, Tahiti, Fiji and Samoa and study their cultures.
   At home, he enjoys exercising, playing the recorder and building elaborate model ships. “It takes patience, but I enjoy it. It’s fun,” he says, pointing out the hundreds of tiny wooden planks pieced together on his most recent model ships, set on separate tables in his workshop. “My Navy experience relates to it.”
   Mr. Roufberg, born in Manhattan, enlisted in the Navy after graduating from Lincoln High School in Jersey City in 1943. He was an instructor in the Navy’s Signal Corps, a move that would later shape his career.
   ”The Navy gave me the idea of traveling and also of learning a trade,” he says. “I was pretty lucky. I never saw any action.”
   His mother wanted him to become a doctor, but, “when I see blood, I faint, so that was out of the question,” he says, laughing. “Then, I planned on being a lawyer, but when I was discharged in 1946, I wanted to be a teacher.”
   Mr. Roufberg attended City College of New York and later a school in Mexico City, where he lived for two years, participated in archeological digs, became fluent in Spanish and earned a degree in Latin American studies. Today, the Incan and Aztec treasures he’s collected through the years decorate his home.
   Mr. Roufberg taught history at several schools in New Jersey and upstate New York before marrying his wife, Ruth, a toy expert and writer, in June 1955. They have two sons, ages 46 and 50, and a 5-year-old grandson.
   The couple moved to South Brunswick in 1957, and the following year, Mr. Roufberg began teaching at Princeton High School. “It’s the best high school in the state,” he says. “There were fantastic teachers. I really had to work hard to keep up with them.”
   During class, Mr. Roufberg tried to tap into his students’ skills and interests. On occasion, he’d even call his students’ parents to find out what their children really enjoyed — like karate or skateboarding, for example.
   ”I was trying to reach children and show them I was interested in them,” he says. “I wanted them to feel good about their education.
   ”I spent hours at home in the evening preparing my lectures for the following day,” he adds. “My job was to make (the subject) interesting. I had to design the course in such a way so it would appeal to different academic abilities.”
   While teaching, he also developed his interests, particularly during the 1960s, a tension-filled decade when fallout shelters, the Cold War and the Civil Rights Movement dominated the headlines.
   For a history buff like Mr. Roufberg, those years proved enlightening as he began exploring Princeton’s history and then-segregated neighborhoods. For the past 30 years, he’s hosted three-hour walking tours of Princeton, many of which have been sponsored by the Princeton YWCA and the Historical Society of Princeton. Some of his favorite spots include the homes of Woodrow Wilson, Paul Robeson and Albert Einstein. Last October, he hosted a tour of the Princeton Cemetery, where Aaron Burr Jr. and Grover Cleveland are buried.
   Mr. Roufberg retired from PHS in 1988. “I loved it, and I miss the staff and the kids,” he says. “It was like teaching college students. I taught mostly seniors, and they were as gifted as college sophomores.”
   He later taught at the Princeton Charter School for four years, but says he was never able to fulfill his longtime dream: making an ethics course mandatory for high school students statewide.
   ”I regret the fact that schools don’t teach students the things they really need to know to succeed in life,” says Mr. Roufberg, who, at one time, taught ethics, logics and philosophy at PHS. “People need to know logic and ethics. They need a course in economics.
   ”I had a very classical education,” he adds. “I could tell you about the ancient Egyptians and the Romans and the Greeks. (But) when I graduated high school, I didn’t know how to write a check. I didn’t know about investments.”
   In 2000, Mr. Roufberg was hired as a part-time lecturer at Rutgers University, where he teaches several classes, such as “The Classics Modernized,” in which he updates a literary classic. For example, his version of Shakespeare’s Othello has the African Moor general running for president; Iago represents the opposite party that wants to undermine the election.
   Mr. Roufberg teaches similar classes at the South Brunswick Senior Center and several area assisted-living centers. Participants often enjoy his discussions about “First Ladies” and “Famous Playwrights and their Plays.”
   Still, no matter how full is schedule gets, he’s always eager to add more classes and activities to his roster. Staying busy, he says with a laugh, keeps him out of trouble — and out of his wife’s hair.