Jodie Garret is a 10 year old student at Bluffington Beach Middle School. She is described as having big, round glasses.
She is nice, but the teacher's pet for her age group (being the first to raise her hand, helping to clean up science experiments, etc). This level of involvement is probably due to her high amount of anxiety over her university prospects and lack of the kind of extra curricular activities universities might find appealing. Her father, James Garret, also told her that “helpfulness is next to godliness”, which also contributes to her "over-involved" nature in class.
Although she does have friends and people generally like her, she chooses to sit by herself at lunch as it is “the 30-40 minutes she gets to be by herself and be quiet”. During this time she will read (during To Be Young Near the Shore, she is seen reading a Nancy Drew book).