A Dean’s Career Advice To Young Women

“As you might imagine, Haley has taught me a lot of lessons, perhaps most importantly she made me realize that we have a responsibility to both encourage and support young women, to (help them) be deliberate in dreaming about the people they want to become.”

Dean Blount’s daughter not only followed her dream during her gap year. She has studied in India, taught English in the Amazon, backpacked around Central America, researched social movements in Brazil and South Africa, and interned at a public radio station in Miami. She has been a Truman Scholar, a Fulbright Scholar and a U.S. State Department Critical Language Scholar. Last year, she published a guide for young adults on how to find and apply for post-college opportunities with the support of fellowship money. And White seems destined for an MBA (Her LinkedIn profile indicates she got a 760 on the GMAT).

‘I CHECKED THE CLENCH IN MY STOMACH AND LISTENED IN AWE’

When Haley graduated from Princeton in 2012, she apparently sprung another surprise on her mother. “When she announced after college that she was planning to go into management consulting in Mexico City, I checked the clench in my stomach and listened in awe as she went on to explain that she needed to understand how business works in emerging economies, how it creates jobs and wealth and can lift people out of poverty. I can’t wait to see the woman that she will become.”

Blount spoke on the changing roles for women and what the future might hold as part of a panel at the Aspen Ideas Festival on July 2. She was part of a panel that included Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington, Brown University President Christina Paxson and former U.S. Representative Jane Harman.

Blount’s daughter, now a consultant with Boston Consulting Group in Mexico City, apparently is as outspoken as she is on gender issues. Last year, when Princeton alumnus Susan Patton caused an uproar by advising Princeton undergraduate women to “find a husband on campus,” Haley dashed off a letter to the student newspaper.

‘THE RIGHT PERSON IS THE ONE YOU FEEL COMFORTABLE BUILDING A LIFE’

“My parents met at Princeton as undergraduates about thirty-years ago and got married six-days after my mother marched through FitzRandolph Gate for graduation,” she wrote. Eighteen-years ago, they got a divorce.

“I don’t fault my parents for their union—without it I wouldn’t exist. I also don’t fault them for their divorce—they handled it with great dignity and took pains to ensure that my brother and I would not be placed in the middle of their disagreements.

“Having grown up in a fractured Princeton marriage, I was dismayed to read Susan Patton ‘77’s letter last week. One of the many lessons my parents’ relationship taught me was that the right person is not necessarily the man or woman who has the same academic credentials as you. The right person is the one with whom you feel comfortable building a life and making difficult personal decisions. Reducing the search for that person to an intellectual yardstick leads to poorly framed thinking about an institution that is so beautiful, fraught, and complex.”

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