News Archives

National Science Foundation Gives $1.5 Million to Boost Math and Science in K-12 Classrooms

PHILADELPHIA -- Schools in West Philadelphia will be supported by a $1.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation to boost their mathematics and science curricula in grades K-12. An original grant to the University of Pennsylvania's Mathematics Department from NSF four years ago founded Access Science, an academically based community service project supported by Penn's Center for Community Partnerships. The new funding, which is approximately $500,000 for three years, will allow Access Science to continue through 2006.

Libeskind in running to rebuild WTC

A team headed by a prominent member of Penn’s architecture faculty has been chosen as one of two finalists for the reconstruction of the World Trade Center in New York. Studio Daniel Libeskind, headed by the Paul Philippe Cret Professor of Architecture, submitted a proposal that includes a 1,575-foot tower, which would be the world’s tallest structure if built, two public parks and a museum in addition to office and retail space. Gary Hack, dean of the Graduate School of Fine Arts, served as the urban planner on the Libeskind team.

Staff Q&A/Margaret Kruesi

Margaret Kruesi’s (Gr’95) affinity for the uncommon goes beyond her day job as a manuscripts librarian at Penn’s Annenberg Rare Books and Manuscript Library. Earlier this year, she spent several days waiting on a hard bench at a park station in Costa Rica just for a glimpse of one of the world’s most ancient animals, the leatherback sea turtle. Kruesi and her group—which included Professor of Anatomy and Geology Peter Dodson—are worried about the ever-dwindling population of these marine reptiles. Here she shares with the Current her passion for conservation.

Campus Buzz

Clearing out the cob-Webs: A couple of popular Penn Web sites have undergone early spring cleaning with updated interfaces. The Penn Library’s Web site (www.library.upenn.edu) got a facelift Feb. 3. The home page design incorporates some of the new Penn Web design elements while keeping the overall feel of the old site. You can also now search the library’s electronic collections as well as the Franklin online catalog from the home page.

Hey, guys, let’s write a book!

Lucy’s Legumes. Neanderthal Nibblers. Upper Paleolithic Cake. These are just some of the many recipes you’ll find in Professor of Anthropology Harold Dibble’s new chef-d’oeuvre, the “Human Evolution Cookbook” (University of Pennsylvania Museum Publications, 2002). With the help of illustrator Brad M. Evans and chef Dan Williamson, both of whom had worked with Dibble at archaeological dig sites in France for over five years, Dibble traces the prehistory of mankind from the earliest humans to the modern Homo sapiens, all the while making corny jokes and poking fun at archaeology.

Phyllis Vizzachero and Chaqueta Marshall

The world on a platter in U-City

Remember when “ethnic cuisine” meant Italian or Chinese? If you do, you’ve been around much longer than I have. But even if you don’t, the University City culinary scene has gone global in the past few years. Laotian, Middle Eastern and African establishments have joined long-established Indian, Thai, Mexican, Italian and Chinese eateries, adding variety to the campus dining scene and bringing new life to U-City’s further reaches.

“Too often, in vitro fertilization is treated like a cash purchase, like buying a car. Making a baby is a very, very different thing.”

—Arthur Caplan, director of the Center for Bioethics, on the decision-making process of older parents who undergo in vitro fertilization procedures (The Sacramento Bee, Jan. 28)

Stick to the original, says Scalia

“The Constitution means today what it meant when it was written,” U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia told an overflow crowd in Harrison Auditorium. That is the basic tenet of a judicial philosophy Scalia calls “originalism.” In a lecture titled “Constitutional Interpretation,” he presented both sides of the argument in the fierce, ongoing debate about how to interpret the United States Constitution. Needless to say, Scalia’s side carried the day.

News briefs

Achebe speaks Noted African novelist Chinua Achebe received a warm welcome from a capacity crowd in Irvine Auditorium when he spoke on “A Celebration of Black Literature” Feb. 14. The author of “Things Fall Apart,” this year’s Penn Reading Project book, devoted much of his address to the subject of portraying the humanity of African peoples. While noting that the characters in his novels share universal human traits, he also criticized authors like Joseph Conrad who, in their portrayals of Africa, overlooked the Africans.