Local historian Chuck Langerman has highlighted the current professional statuses of three Cheltenham alumni:

Dr. David Jaffe (above left)

Dr. Jaffe, a 1973 graduate, is a pediatric neurologist in the Richmond, Virginia area.

He attended Lynnewood Elementary and Elkins Park Junior High School before attending Cheltenham High, where he was a gymnast.

Dr. Jaffe previously served as the “gym guy” with a program for emotionally disturbed children in Philadelphia when he decided to matriculate at the Ringling Clown College in Venice, Florida. After graduating from Clown College and working in the circus, he enrolled in college, went to Temple University Medical School, specialized in Neurology, and became a well-respected pediatric neurologist.

Mark Voit (above middle)

Voit, a 1979 graduate, is a Michigan State University Professor of Astrophysics.

Professor Voit is also the Associate Dean for Undergraduate Studies at Michigan State where his duties include oversight of curriculum development, student advising, study abroad programs, and career services. He authored the textbooks used in his classes.

He ran cross country at Cheltenham High for longtime coach Tom Sexton and went on to graduate from Princeton University in 1983 and earned his Ph.D. in Astrophysics from the University of Colorado in 1990.

Tamara “Tammy” Dukes (above right)

Dukes, a 1985 graduate, was recently appointed assistant principal at San Leandro High School in the San Francisco Bay area. 

An accomplished bilingual educator, Ms. Dukes has twenty years of experience in the fields of education and public health. Her areas of expertise include K-12 instruction, youth development, program/project management, and equity-focused leadership and instructional coaching.

Dukes has taught gardening to women in Mexico’s border towns, worked in violence prevention at Youth ALIVE!, taught Spanish language and literature to Spanish-speakers in Oakland, and coached principals on addressing equity problems.

She has a bachelor’s degree in Philosophy and Spanish from Duke University, a master of arts in Spanish Language and Literature from Middlebury College in Vermont, and her teaching and administrative credentials from San Francisco University.

At Cheltenham High School, Dukes was on the varsity tennis team, an editor on the school yearbook, and served an internship as a kid reporter for the Philadelphia Daily News.

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