I've been waiting to tell stories about my Princeton experiences until I wasn't angry about them, and could write with compassion and understanding, or at least with humor. I'm afraid that's not likely to happen anytime soon (despite my best efforts at a Buddhist monastery). But perhaps my Princeton stories, such as the one below, will help to explain some of my later decisions.
I was admitted to Princeton with a graduate fellowship from the university, which Princeton took away after I was awarded an NSF Graduate Fellowship. Like several mathematics students in the years ahead of me, I planned to use my NSF Graduate Fellowship to spend a year studying in England at the University of Cambridge, deferring my arrival in Princeton for a year. Princeton insisted that I funnel the NSF fellowship through them, since Cambridge tuition was less than the fellowship stipend, and Princeton planned to pocket the difference.
However, in my year, Cambridge significantly raised tuition on foreign students. When I forwarded Cambridge's bill to Princeton, Princeton balked. They didn't want to pay, since they wanted more of a cut. This went back and forth by snail mail throughout the year. During that time, the exchange rate turned against me, by a significant amount. What Princeton finally paid was less than Cambridge's bill. I argued it for years with both Princeton and Cambridge.
When I was a Harvard-Radcliffe undergrad, an advising office told students to always take advantage of our rights, by requesting and obtaining our records. You never know what information you'll find, and information is power.
Sometime during my argument with Princeton about the debt to Cambridge, I asked to see my file in the Dean's office. The staff were reluctant to show it to me, but they eventually gave in. I wasn't allowed to photocopy anything, but I was permitted to take notes by hand, while balancing the file on my knees. A note from the math department Chair to the Dean about the Cambridge debt included the line "The jig is up." It pointed out that I was on to them, about their attempt to hold onto funds that they should have forwarded to Cambridge.
Even with this smoking gun, Princeton refused to pay the remaining balance.
Eventually I got tired of being in Cambridge's bad books, and I paid the debt myself.