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The Anchored University

Supporting the next generation of ethical technologists
Students at the registration table for the Responsible Computing Challenge.

This past spring, scholars, students, technologists, activists, and West Philadelphia community members gathered for a workshop that planted the seeds for RC4JustFutures’ work moving forward.

(Image: Courtesy of Penn Carey Law)

Supporting the next generation of ethical technologists

The Responsible Computing for Just Futures Initiative, an initiative of the Responsible Computing Challenge at Penn Carey Law, has ambitious plans for the mindset with which the next generation of Penn students will engage careers at the intersection of law and technology.

From Penn Carey Law

Edible Books at the Kelly Writers House
Seven people around a table with cake during the Edible Books event.

The 14th-annual Edible Books party at the Kelly Writers House featured 30-some creations based on literature titles, often involving puns.

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Edible Books at the Kelly Writers House

The annual Edible Books contest at the Kelly Writers House features food creations inspired by books, often involving puns based on the titles. In this 14th year, 30-some entries were admired and (mostly) eaten.
University announces Penn Global Middle East Distinguished Visiting Scholar Initiative
Dahlia Scheindlin, Shay Hazkani, and Amal Jamal

(Left to right) Dahlia Scheindlin, Shay Hazkani, and Amal Jamal are the inaugural Distinguished Visiting Scholars in the Penn Global Middle East Distinguished Visiting Scholar Initiative.

(Left image: Eyal Warshavsky)

University announces Penn Global Middle East Distinguished Visiting Scholar Initiative

The program will formally launch in fall 2025 with the arrival of the inaugural visiting scholar, Dahlia Scheindlin, followed by Shay Hazkani in spring 2026, and Amal Jamal in fall 2026.
Penn Vet’s Wildlife Futures Program launches habitat initiative for Philadelphia bats
Nick Tanner and Daniel Flinchbaugh with a finished bat box.

Penn Facilities and Real Estate Services assistant landscape planner Daniel Flinchbaugh (left) and Penn undergraduate Nick Tanner (right) with a nearly finished bat box in the Weitzman School of Design Fabrication Lab.

(Image: John Donges/University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine)

Penn Vet’s Wildlife Futures Program launches habitat initiative for Philadelphia bats

With the bat population on a sharp decline since 2008, the Program collaborated with Penn Sustainability and Penn Facilities and Real Estate Services to develop bat boxes designed to mimic tree habitat and support the daily needs and overall health of bats.

From Penn Vet

A vast collection related to public markets comes to the Penn Libraries
yellowed historic document with a grid of squares and a hand holding a photo

A map of the stalls at the historic Reading Terminal Market in Philadelphia. 

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A vast collection related to public markets comes to the Penn Libraries

Tens of thousands of items related to public markets acquired by Penn alum David K. O’Neil create a collection unique in size and scope. Spanning four centuries from locations near and far, his collection now has a home at the Penn Libraries.
Two Penn faculty awarded Pew Fellowships
Sculptor Michelle Lopez sitting and talking in front of her sculpture and musician Tyshawn Sorey standing in front of a grafitti on a wall

The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage awarded two Penn faculty each a Pew Fellowship in the Arts: artist and sculptor Michelle Lopez (left) in the Stuart Weitzman School of Design; and musician and composer Tyshawn Sorey (right) in the School of Arts & Sciences.

(Images (left) by University of Pennsylvania Communications, and (right) Ogata courtesy of the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage.)

Two Penn faculty awarded Pew Fellowships

Two Penn faculty -- installation artist and sculptor Michelle Lopez, and composer and musician Tyshawn Sorey -- each have been awarded one of 12 arts fellowships by the Pew Center for Arts & Heritage in Philadelphia.
Across Pennsylvania, Penn students practice ‘political empathy’ to connect across divides
HOPE painted colorfully on the exterior of the Hazelton Integration Project.

(On homepage) The Political Empathy Lab visited the Hazleton Integration Project, a nonprofit and community center serving a city that has seen a large increase in Dominican immigrants over the past two decades.

(Image: Courtesy of Penn’s Political Empathy Lab)

Across Pennsylvania, Penn students practice ‘political empathy’ to connect across divides

Through the SNF Paideia Program, seven undergraduates and political scientist Lia Howard traveled all over the commonwealth this summer, listening to residents talk about their lives and the issues that matter to them.
Update on Penn’s $100M pledge to Philadelphia public schools
Exterior of Roxborough High School in Philadelphia

The funding Penn is providing to Philadelphia Public Schools is being used to remediate environmental hazards in schools throughout the city, including the 100-year-old Roxborough High School in North Philadelphia.

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Update on Penn’s $100M pledge to Philadelphia public schools

Significant progress has been made in the four years since Penn pledged $100 million to the School District of Philadelphia to remediate environmental hazards, including asbestos and lead, in hundreds of school buildings.
Testing a novel, community-driven response to heat islands in Philadelphia
Hanzhong Luo has his body heat scanned in a cooling shelter prototype.

Dorit Aviv uses an infrared camera to demonstrate the effects of the Tenopy’s radiant cooling panels on Hanzhong Luo.

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Testing a novel, community-driven response to heat islands in Philadelphia

Researchers from three University of Pennsylvania schools collaborated with a Hunting Park nonprofit to design, build, and test a prototype of a cooling shelter to place at a bus stop.
A climate expert’s return to Penn
Portrait of Jen Wilcox

Jen Wilcox has returned to the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy at the Stuart Weitzman School of Design and to the School of Engineering and Applied Science following three years in at the U.S. Department of Energy, where she served in the Biden Administration as the principal deputy assistant secretary for the Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management.

(Image: Courtesy of Jen Wilcox)

A climate expert’s return to Penn

Jen Wilcox, an expert on direct-air capture, is the inaugural faculty appointment in the Kleinman Center and served for three years as principal deputy assistant secretary for the Office of Fossil Energy in the U.S. Department of Energy. She discusses her time away and her return to Penn.