When English as a Second Language teacher Jo Habibi talks about Broad Run High School senior Puneet Sandhu she begins to cry.
"If I could have kids that could grow up with these kind of morals," she said trailing off.
Habibi has known Sandhu since middle school and gets upset when she thinks of her graduating.
"If we could clone her that would be great," she said. "To maneuver through this teenage society and still end up with these values is amazing."
While everyone around her is getting sad thinking about her graduation with Broad Run’s Class of 2007, Sandhu is facing one of life’s biggest moments the way she has faced everything, with determination and subtle emotion.
"I’m excited. I want to be an architect," she said, her voice soft. "I like coming up with some thing on a page and then you see it come to life."
A TWIN to brother Sukjinder, with an older sister, Kawaldeep, 27, and an older brother, Booby, 25, family is at the center of everything the 18-year-old honor roll student does.
Her mother and father, Amarjit and Mghar, moved their family to the United States when Sandhu was 9. Speaking no English when she arrived, Sandhu took ESL classes in elementary school, mastering the language by the time she was in middle school.
"She is just such a hard worker," Habibi, who first met Sandhu as a teaching assistant in middle school, said. "Anything you gave her she did her best at. You never really had to get on Puneet’s back about anything."
Sandhu attributes her work ethic to her relationship to her mother.
"My mom always wanted me to study hard, to have more than she did with education and a career," she said.
Attending Northern Virginia Community College in the fall, Sandhu already has plans to move on to a four-year university.
"I am a little scared to go out by myself," she said.
GROWING UP IN Loudoun, Sandhu learned how to balance the culture she lived in with the Indian culture of her family.
"I have seen her beautifully establish her identity and her bicultural identity," Nathalie Khattar, Sandhu’s guidance counselor, said. "She has developed very gracefully."
Jim Dunning, who first met Sandhu in study hall two years ago after taking over for the teacher, said he was amazed with the balance he saw within Sandhu.
"From the beginning I was impressed with how she balances her social circle with her family and with school," he said. "She makes it look easy."
While most teenagers are dating and going out on the weekend, Sandhu spends most of her time with her family and studying. She admits that her mother can seem overprotective, but said it does not bother her to follow what her mother asks.
"I respect my mom’s choice," she said. "I know everything she does for is because it is good for me."
Showing maturity that many teenagers do not possess, Sandhu said she does not have any urge to disobey her parents or rebel, even if that means missing out on some typically American activities.
"My parents have done so much for me that I can at least let them raise their daughter the way they want to," she said. "I always keep that in mind because I have seen my parents work so hard to give us things."
THE CLOSENESS OF the Sandhu family became very important one night in December 2005, when an electrical fire started at her older brother’s computer.
"I was sleeping upstairs and I woke up and I couldn’t breathe," Sandhu said. "I ran downstairs and I told my mother that there was a fire."
Sandhu and her family escaped the fire, which burned through both of her brothers’ rooms and the side of their home. The family relocated to a townhouse in Ashburn Village while the damage was repaired.
Dunning said he was surprised to learn about the fire.
"You wouldn’t have known anything was wrong from her," he said.
"We were in crisis mode here, trying to figure out how to help and they were handling it with so much dignity," Khattar said.
For her part, Sandhu said she realized immediately how much worse it could have been. None of her family members were hurt and they were eventually going to be able to move back home. She joked the only negative thing to her was none of her school books were damaged in the blaze.
"I was glad that people didn’t make a big deal out of it," she said. "If someone had gotten hurt, then it would have been different."
THE WAY SANDHU handled her family’s crisis last year comes as no surprise to the adults who know her best.
"She is a symbol of strength and resilence," Khattar said. "She shows that you don’t have to lose the values of your culture to be a success here."
But, Dunning said, do not let her maturity fool you.
"Just listen to her talk on her phone to her friends and you’ll see she’s just like any other teenager," he said. "When she’s in her own element, she’s just a regular kid."