At Miami Palmetto Senior High School, she rose quickly to be president of the student body and soon became known as a standout member of the school’s speech-and-debate team. “She could write and give a speech that would leave the audience clapping, but she could do a dramatic play or a humorous one and she was outstanding in all those things,” says Nathaniel Persily, a former classmate and debate teammate of Jackson’s. “She is the same person today as she was at Palmetto when we were both 13.”

Persily, a law professor at Stanford, says Jackson dazzled audiences. “I remember people, when she would do the dramatic interpretation, which is the sort of serious plays, literally people crying who watched her because she was so good,” he says. “And, of course, people dying with laughter when she did the humorous ones.”

Persily calls Jackson “the most morally centered person” he has ever met in his life. “You look at this gold-plated résumé that she has, and you would think that she’s been trying to climb a particular ladder to get to the next rung. But she’s never been that kind of person,” he says. “She is incredibly humble. She is very generous, giving, self-deprecating — you know, the least arrogant person I’ve ever met.”