Penn in the News

Many students and parents worried about racking up loans while paying for four years of college may not realize a stark fact: Four-year degrees often take five or six years. Statistics reported by colleges and universities, compiled by the federal Department of Education, show around 40 percent of students in Pennsylvania and New Jersey graduate in four years from the school where they began. A majority of students nationwide take more than four years to finish.

Garth Saloner, the dean of the Stanford Graduate School of Business, announced his resignation on Monday, saying he did not want “a baseless and protracted lawsuit related to a contentious divorce” to hurt the school’s reputation. The divorce involves two Stanford professors. Mr. Saloner began a relationship with the wife shortly after the couple separated, Stanford acknowledged on Monday. The husband is suing the university, saying he was discriminated against.

Cindy Otto of the School of Veterinary Medicine is highlighted for her work with the Working Dog Center.

When several sexual assaults were reported at West Chester University during the last school year, students started paying attention. But no one knew quite how to react. It was as though students shrugged and said, " 'We're just going to let it go, we're just going to let it happen, and next weekend we're going to let it happen again,' " said junior Ma'Shiya Queen. The incidents occurred as national scrutiny of sexual assaults on college campuses was intensifying. Students elsewhere were taking action, and even the White House was getting involved.

Mississippi authorities said after midnight Monday that they’d ended their search for a Delta State University professor suspected of killing his live-in girlfriend in their gulf coast home, and then allegedly fatally shooting a fellow professor on the campus five hours away, which had prompted a lengthy lockdown of the small school on Monday. The suspect, Shannon S. Lamb, 45, a Delta State professor of geography and social sciences, died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound., according to the Associated Press.

Caryn Lerman of the Perelman School of Medicine is featured for developing a transcranial direct brain stimulation test.

After heavy lobbying from some of the nation’s most elite institutions of higher education, the President has just abandoned his effort to rank the nation’s 7,000 colleges and universities. So, with college application season almost upon us, where should aspiring college students and their parents look for advice? In my view, not U.S. News and World Report’s annual college guide (out last week).