Heather A. Davis

  There’s an arts club for just about everybody at Penn, from stand-up comedy and youth-focused theater to a jazz ensemble and an all-male, South Asian-inspired dance troupe.

WHAT: Initially created by Penn in 1999, UC Green is now an independent nonprofit community greening program. The group’s Pruning Club program cares for selected blocks around University City each season and trains volunteers during the summer in proper tree trimming techniques.

Photo credit: Candace diCarlo Marilyn Jordan Taylor says it’s a great time to be thinking big about design.

John Kindness Wendy Steiner believes musical theater is more than just song and dance.

WHAT: The West Philly Tool Library is a lending library for home and garden tools. WHERE: The Library is located at 4620 Woodland Ave. It is open on Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m., and on Saturday mornings from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Paul Krugman wants you to know that the current economic downturn is not your father’s recession. It’s more like your grandfather’s.

Photo credit: Candace diCarlo As an undergraduate at Indiana State University, Andrew Porter tried his hand at chemistry. It didn’t take, so he turned next to mathematics.

WHAT: The long-planned Weave Bridge, a pedestrian bridge that runs above the Amtrak rail lines and connects the main campus with the Hollenback fields, is now open. We recently hiked out to East campus to take a look. ALMOST DONE: Though the bridge is open, workers are still putting on the finishing touches. All work should be completed this spring.

Penn’s various presses have been busily cranking out some new titles—from business to international affairs, ancient studies to contemporary art.

New genetic research from Penn has found that Africans can detect bitter tastes better and more easily than Europeans or Asians—a trait that may have made it easier for African peoples to detect potentially poisonous plants in natu