Jacques Domenge '95

The Rochambeau monde is one he has known as a STUDENT, as an ALUMNUS, and today as a PARENT. A 1995 Graduate, today Jacques emphasizes how well Rochambeau prepared him for his future, “Because of this, choosing to send my daughter to Rochambeau was a no-brainer, and all of my former classmates in the DC area have done the same.” Alumni reunions?...“ALL THE TIME!”

Besides super-parenting, Jacques is a motivational career coach and owner of a consulting firm. Passionate about supporting businesses and individuals to reach their potential, Jacques has developed a career around inspiration…“My starting assumption in everything that I do, is that with the right information and coaching, regular people can become extraordinary.” Jacques is currently the Assistant Director of Coaching and Education at the Johns Hopkins Business School AND the owner of an Organizational Development Consultancy. His application of organizational development and behavioral psychology have made him an active and unique contributor to this field locally and abroad. His vocation is more than a job, and he humbly admits that it took time to get to where he is today, including a variety of jobs spanning in education, recruitment, and finance -- “Truth be told, had I learned what really drove me early on, I might have been able to start working in a career that I love about six years sooner.” Naturally, Jacques builds his sessions on his own experiences too...helping inspire students and professionals to pursue their passions early on and to drive their skills into what they love doing best.  

Experimental and intellectually curious, Jacques’s work is constantly evolving. “I regularly present at global conferences on what I am learning as I go.” His goal this coming year is to present at a Tedx event on the topic of the importance of compassion as a guiding principle. He has also most recently applied to Georgetown’s Executive Certificate in Leadership Coaching, he says, “one should never stop learning, and this strikes me as a great opportunity to be a little bit more effective as a coach.“ 

Jacques has a M.Sc in Organization Development from American University and a B.A in Philosophy and Communication from the University of Maryland. In addition to his work, he enjoys photography, biking, and spending time with his family at home.  Jacques knows what is essential: “As long as I can cultivate and inspire compassion in others, occasionally experience awe, and have regular time with my family, I will be able to say that I want for nothing.”

 A FEW WORDS FOR ROCHAMBEAU 

My experience at Rochambeau was undoubtedly formative for me. I attended from the early 80’s through to 1995. I can’t say that it was an easy experience, as every day was challenging and rigorous. Overall, I’m convinced that my experiences were extraordinarily helpful in preparing me for the next step which was my undergraduate degree. After graduating from Rochambeau, I was astonished at how easy my classes and exams were at the University of Maryland (UMD). I’m not diminishing the caliber of the education at UMD, rather emphasizing how well Rochambeau prepared me. As I understand it, the school has adapted over the years and I have no doubt that the students receive the same rigorous education, while having a significantly more positive experience than I had. On a separate note, and maybe more importantly, Rochambeau gave me something that has shaped who I am more than anything. The entire time I was there, my classmates came from every corner of the world. Each of them, like me, was from somewhere else. The community that I knew for all of those years was one that identified less with one national identity, and more with a tapestry of global nomads. This tapestry of cultures is my tribe, and I am home whenever I am around people that have had the privilege of living outside of their country of origin. As it turns out, this community is growing, not just because of Rochambeau alumni, but because the world has become such a multicultural place where movement between nations has become the norm. In effect, Rochambeau has been ahead of its time all along by creating global citizens who both celebrate cultural differences and more importantly, blur the lines of division between people from all nations. The world could use more Lycée Rochambeau’s if you ask me.