9/25
News Archives
A complete list of stories featured on Penn Today.
Filter Stories
Archive ・ Penn Current
Plan may fix traffic tangle
If, some years from now, you no longer feel you are taking your life in your hands when you cross a busy intersection or ride your bike in Philadelphia, you may well have three Penn undergraduates to thank. That's because Herb Chan (EAS'99), Michael Loester (EAS'99) and Chris Wallgren (EAS'99) will spend the next year doing their part to make Philadelphia a little more bike- and pedestrian-friendly, with a little help from their adviser and a friend in City Hall.
Archive ・ Penn Current
AWARDS AND HONORS
NEH funds two Penn projects The National Endowment for the Humanities awarded two large grants and a summer research stipend to Penn scholars. The Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary project, directed by Ake W. Sjoberg, Ph.D., professor emeritus of Assyrian and curator of the Museium's tablet collection, received $270,600. The project, which began in 1976 with its first NEH grant, has so far published volumes on letters A and B; Sumerian has 18 letters. The Shakespeare Web site received $180,000 (see related story).
Archive ・ Penn Current
Bill Ferris
William R. Ferris, Ph.D., describes himself as an independent. His appointment last fall to chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, succeeding former Penn President Sheldon Hackney, was viewed by many as a continuation of a move away from ideological, partisan players in the office. In an era of budget slashing in arts and humanities programs, Ferris is taking on his new role with enthusiasm and nothing short of sheer optimism for the future of the humanities.
Archive ・ Penn Current
Gimbel Gym gets in shape
The University community will be able to sweat in style by the start of next semester, thanks to a $1.2 million makeover that will transform the first two floors of Gimbel Gym into a high-tech fitness center, replete with new weight training and aerobic equipment, video monitors, air conditioning and lots of natural light. Preliminary construction is underway on the gymnasium renovations, which received a $500,000 donation from Penn parents Ellen and Howard Katz, who will remain active in raising the balance needed for the redo.
Archive ・ Penn Current
More learning, less teaching
The traditional University lecture is not dead, but it 's not the best model for learning. This message, delivered -- in a lecture format -- to about 70 people, was part of the keynote address for a recent student-organized symposium on the need for universities to shift from a teaching paradigm to a learning paradigm in educating their students. Lectures fall in the teaching paradigm category.
Archive ・ Penn Current
NEH grant will expand popular Shakespeare Web site
Fragile, ancient texts, traditionally guarded and sequestered by the Special Collections librarians on the sixth floor of Van Pelt, suddenly are accessible to not just serious scholars at Penn but also to teachers, high school students, anyone with access to an Internet-connected computer anywhere in the world.
Archive ・ Penn Current
Fists of fury, fists of fun
Photo by Sondra Cartwright Members of Penn's Tae Kwon Do Club instructed young girls from the West Philadelphia community in the Asian art of self-defense during a Neighborhood Youth Sports Program workshop April 11. At the event, the girls learned the basic moves and saw demonstrations of the technique in action. The workshop is part of an ongoing series of Recreation Department programs that pair Penn athletes with neighborhood youth.
Archive ・ Penn Current
Global divas, High Llamas, and Dead veterans
Grateful Dead fans will want to tune in "The World Cafe" on Friday, May 1, when band alumni Bob Weir and Rob Wasserman's visit to Tongue & Groove Studios is the feature of the day. For the rest of the next two weeks, host David Dye and the Cafe crew will serve up a little something for everyone: Thursday, April 30 Jolene performs music from its new release "In the Gloaming"
Archive ・ Penn Current
U. strikes high-Caliber agreement
Business execs taking courses in Wharton's "Working Knowledge Series" next semester need not take any big steps away from the board room to be marked "present" for class. In the first collaboration of its kind, the University has teamed with Baltimore-based Caliber Learning Network Inc. in a distributed learning agreement that will propel traditional classroom experiences into the age of the Internet, Penn Interim Provost Michael L. Wachter announced last week.
Archive ・ Penn Current
Fiesta Filipina
Photo by Mark Garvin Penn's Filipino community took to the stage -- and the dance floor -- April 10 for the campus' first-ever "Fiesta del Barrio," a celebration of Filipino culture. In addition to native dance performances, festival-goers were treated to fashion shows, musical performances, an array of Filipino foods and a dance party. The festival was held to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the end of Spanish colonial rule in the Philippines.