Princeton
This article has poor organization and/or formatting and requires revision to meet RealCTY's quality standards. |
( Julie is currently working on this page, since it was previously a stub. It will take a while to complete, so bear with me (ahhh bear!!). Feel free to add, just know that it is not yet complete.)
The Princeton site was created in 2006 for students who had aged out of the CTY programs. The JHU CTY program has been tweaking the site every year, and actually listening to students, so as to improve the quality of the new site. Only a handful of CTYers continue on to the Princeton program, but with the recent improvements in staff and the overall program, it should now be seen as a wonderful choice after CTY.
Contents
Location
The Princeton site, is of course, at Princeton University. A horribly complicated campus. Because it is so easy to get lost around campus, students are not allowed to wander/explore on their own.
Dorms
CTY PRN only uses two of the dorms on campus. They are next to each other and are connected with an arch way. Students are allowed to hang out on the quad outside of these buildings and around the arch way during unstructured time. One building houses all the female halls, and the other houses the men. The girls' dorm also houses the health office, the main office, and all of the administrative offices. They are not air conditioned. Bring fans. The dorms have suites and singles with dressers, bookcases, desks, and closets. Some rooms have balconies, and all rooms have windows that open and come with screens to let cool air in and keep bugs out. Most bathrooms are okay. Third floor entrance one didn't have doors on their stalls, instead there were shower curtains that didn't quite do the job. Bring shower shoes, and be prepared for some awkward early morning bathroom incidents.
Dining Hall
The Rocky dining hall is a hike from the dorms. Students are allowed to leave their dorms at 8 o'clock to walk to the dining hall. It is down the street from the droms, past the UStore, under an archway, up some stairs, and across a quad. The dining hall resembles the Great Hall at Hogwarts. There are long tables to sit at up and down the room and two circular tables. One sat at by the Oval Table Mafia. The food is decent, although frequently mislabeled, such as the Potato Puffs that were labeled as Eggplant Parmigiana one morning. There is a salad bar, pb&j station, fresh fruit, hot meals, cereal, a table of rotating desserts,and different flavors of ice cream at every meal. One of the favorite ice creams was Passionfruit Sorbet, that only lasted a day, for obvious reasons.
Classrooms
All students have class (as well as Opening and Closing Ceremonies) in McCosh Hall. The building is abnormally cold in some classrooms, especially in the basement (dungeon) in which the GPOL classes were held. But in other classrooms, the air conditioning was not working for much of the first week. The classrooms were a bit of a walk from the dining hall, but it was a nice time to wake up, talk to friends, and walk extremely slowly to make morning classes a bit shorter. All classes have lunch at 12, which makes the morning class a tad long, especially when you don't get much sleep the night before...
McCosh 50, the location of Opening Ceremonies, the Talent Show, and Closing Ceremonies, was also the room in which several of the class scenes for Transformers 2 were filmed. This is not in any way an endorsement of the movie, just an interesting fact.
Dances/Casino Night
The dances were held in a multi-cultural house a few blocks away from the dorms. So this walk was not fun when wearing heels for the dance. It was nice though, walking back from the dance because it would be nice and cool outside, so you would be at a comfortable temperature by the time you got back to the dorms.
Casino night was held in another house a walk away from the dorms, past the WaWa that some students snuck out to.
Princeton Courses
Human Nature and Technology
Daniel Estrada taught section A in 2008 and 2009 with John, also from Lancaster, as a TA. Section B was taught by Michele Merritt and Diana. This is a favorite among students, and the only one that doesn't take existence for granted. During the first week, students learn basic philosophies of the mind. After establishing the fact that we don't know anything, they introduce the idea that all technology changes our definition of ourselves. Students study philosophers from Ancient Greece to those still going out for a drink with certain instructors. This course is challenging and definitely up to CTY standards. It is this CTYer's 2nd favorite class she has taken. (It culminated with a viewing of Wall.E. <3)
Global Politics: Human Rights and Justice
Global Politics, or simply GPOL, had four sections in 2009. Each class is structured slightly differently, and approaches the issues of human rights in a different manner, but all note the history of human rights and human rights violations, and later move on to wrestle with the overwhelmingly large question of the role human rights should take in a nation's foreign policy. This issue is addressed through simulations, debates, and class discussions on current and recent human rights issues, such as torture, genocide, and relief efforts.
Staff
Main Office
Health Office
RA's
There were two returning RA's this year, JC and Katrina.
- JC- There has been a religion created around the awesomeness of JC. He de-mined Cambodia in Middle School. 'Nuff said. He is currently taking a year off from school to work at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC. He also writes amazing poetry.
- James- Went to Carlisle as a student. He is 19, but he is going to be a senior at Harvard. Another fabulous RA. He was the DJ for all of the dances, and made sure to play lots of current music, some favorites, and of course, the high holy canon at every dance. He also taught students how to rave, and made sure to play enough techno so that a circle could be formed and ravers could, well rave.
Instructors and TA's
Activities
Dances
- The dances had refreshments. These usually consisted of cookies, chips, sprite, soda, diet soda, and water. Which was a very nice change from Lancaster dances, which didn't even have water other than the water fountain.
- During the dances, a nicely air conditioned room played decent movies, like Jurassic Park and Harry Potter 5.
- James Fish was the DJ for every dance. He is a CTY Carlisle alum, so he understood the necessity to play the Canonat every dance. He played a lot of hip hop, but that is unavoidable because that's what teenagers nowadays apparently like to listen to. But favorites were thrown in that everyone could dance to.
Mandatory Fun
Tri-Muggle Tournament
Casino Night
Things We Like/Traditions Migrating To Princeton
Princeton Passionfruit
Rachel Hall
- To Da Boys.
- To the Female Bananas.
- To raking in the bananas.
- To National Security: 3, Human Rights: 0.
- To always having Facebook.
- To being wimps.
- To grass orgies in the sunshine.
- To parties in dorm rooms when it rains and cancels activities.
- To RAMEN.
- To Emily Mamula. If you ever take more of my ramen, I will eat your soul.
- To the Knights of the Oval Table, the Mafia, and the CTYxcore.
- To living in Hogwarts for 3 weeks.
- To Brynn.
- To Barry (Mom), Katrina (Mommy), and Josh (Big Momma).
- To Dom, JC, Kate, Charleen, Ore, and James.
- To sketchball SRAs.
- To Silent Football and ASA.
- To "awesome".
- To Camp Touch Yourself.
- To unexpected mutual friends.
- To Passionfruit sorbet.
- To Halo and Morning Glory and Small World and The Record Exchange and CVS and starbucks and the movie theater.
- To always saying yes...except when it actually might change things.
- To fingerpainting and modge podge and Beat It and Defend Yourselves Against Bears and Extreme Inactivity.
- To trying to introduce myself to everyone...and not succeeding in the slightest.
- To my second staff lanyard. It seems like my only chance for another one will be as an actual staff member.
- To getting AP exam scores halfway through the last week.
- To boobtag in the library and on Facebook.
- To doing just about anything EXCEPT working on our thesis papers.
- To sleep-deprivation.
- To Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Jello Pudding.
- To our notorious TA, even if she won't tell us why.
- To crying during Hotel Rwanda and The Pianist.
- To falling asleep during 12 Monkeys.
- To right foot first.
- To running up on stage and doing the Time Warp at every dance.
- To marrying 23 people and Howan's hat at Casino Night.
- To becoming an assassin.
- To being too damn adorable for anyone to stay angry.
- To hickeys and bruises that fade just in time.
- To turning a curtain into a dress...and then having to fix that dress every ten seconds.
- To Never Have I Ever and Truth or Truth.
- To Carlisle and Lancaster, coexisting in harmony.
- To CTY PoRN.
- To arguments on the walk back from the last dance.
- To feeling unloved.
- To feeling loved.
- To hugs and laps and smiles and laughs and bites and stomachs and circles and grass and statues and trees and stairs.
- To the Princeton bugs. I wanted you all DEAD.
- To hugging RAs. Even when they didn't want us to.
- To TAs who don't like hugs.
- To a million other things I can't think of right now.
- But...as of this moment...
- I love CTY
and I love the Passionfruit.