Penn in the News

The death last week of former University of California system president and UC Irvine chancellor Jack W. Peltason at 91 elicited warm memories of the modest political scientist who achieved high positions in American academia without losing his sense of humor. He also was known for his role in helping to build new university campuses from scratch and growing them to maturity.

A six-month-old Facebook post about the conflict in Gaza, receiving attention only recently, has spurred a debate over hate speech at Connecticut College that has some students calling on the administration to condemn racist remarks.

Jonah Berger of the Wharton School joins a discussion on what it means to go viral.

Almost 30 years ago, Trinity College, in Washington, D.C., faced a crisis familiar to many small institutions today: It lost the ability to attract the predominantly well-to-do women it had traditionally enrolled. So the Roman Catholic women’s college adopted a risky strategy. It changed its base, focusing instead on serving primarily African-American and Latina women who face financial disadvantages.

Mitesh Patel of the Perelman School of Medicine says, “Adopting and maintaining … healthier habits is challenging, and new strategies are needed.”

Phi Kappa Psi, the University of Virginia fraternity depicted in a 2014 Rolling Stone story as the center of a brutal college “rape culture,” says it may seek damages from the legendary music magazine after Charlottesville, Va., police said Monday that they found no evidence that corroborates the article’s main contention.

The University of Delaware is refusing to fulfill a congressman's request that it release information about who is funding a prominent climate change skeptic’s research. The university is the first of seven institutions facing similar requests to publicly deny them, citing concerns about academic freedom.

Stewart Friedman of the Wharton School comments on women bearing the primary responsibility for childrearing and how that affects their careers.

Jonah Berger of the Wharton School comments on viral Web sensations.

College fraternities and sororities, concerned that students accused of sexual assault are treated unfairly, are pushing Congress to make it harder for universities to investigate rape allegations. The groups' political arm plans to bring scores of students to Capitol Hill on April 29 to lobby for a requirement that the criminal justice system resolve cases before u