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Penn Engineering and Steppingstone Scholars launch a STEM equity and innovation lab
two middle school-age students work on a robotics project.

(Pre-pandemic image) In the Blended Learning Initiative, Steppingstone Scholars use Arduino based robotics, coding and design thinking to ready themselves for Java certification and AP computer science as well as prepare for college or careers in STEM fields. (Image: Penn Engineering Today)

Penn Engineering and Steppingstone Scholars launch a STEM equity and innovation lab

Penn Engineering and Steppingstone will begin developing a new blended AP Computer Science course for the fall 2021 semester, in which engineering students will create online content modules to supplement high school classroom instruction.

From Penn Engineering Today

Graduate mentors provide undergrads with ‘any path to math’
Four portraits of people, from left to right: Abigail Timmel, Mona Merling, George Wang, and Thomas Brazelton.

From left to right: Abigail Timmel; Mona Merling, assistant professor of mathematics; George Wang, doctoral candidate; and Thomas Brazelton, doctoral student. (Image: Omnia)

Graduate mentors provide undergrads with ‘any path to math’

The Directed Reading Program pairs undergraduates with graduate student mentors for advanced learning.

From Omnia

Plato was right. Earth is made, on average, of cubes
Statue of Plato against blue sky

The ancient philosopher Plato conjectured that the universe was composed of particular geometric shapes; the earth, of cubes. Findings from a multidisciplinary research team found truth in Plato's belief. 

Plato was right. Earth is made, on average, of cubes

The ancient Greek philosopher was on to something, the School of Arts & Sciences’ Douglas Jerolmack and colleagues found.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Coronavirus models aren’t crystal balls. So what are they good for?
Microscopic coronavirus images superimposed over digital global map

Coronavirus models aren’t crystal balls. So what are they good for?

Epidemiologists and data scientists have been gathering data, making calculations, and creating mathematical models to answer critical questions about COVID-19, but math cannot account for the unpredictability of human behavior.

Penn Medicine

Penn’s pioneering mathematicians
side by side portraits of Dudley Weldon Woodard and William Waldron Schieffelin Claytor

Penn’s pioneering mathematicians

Two of the first African Americans to earn a Ph.D. in mathematics, Dudley Weldon Woodard and William Waldron Schieffelin Claytor worked on fundamental problems in the field of topology and supported graduate-level math education for minority students.

Erica K. Brockmeier

Three Penn faculty named 2020 Sloan Research Fellows
liang feng, erica korb, and weijie su headshots

Three Penn faculty named 2020 Sloan Research Fellows

Engineer Liang Feng, neuroscientist Erica Korb, and statistician Weijie Su each received the competitive and prestigious award honoring early-career researchers.

Erica K. Brockmeier

Where math meets physics
a person standing in front of a chalkboard covered in equations

Where math meets physics

Collaborations between physicists and mathematicians at Penn showcase the importance of research that crosses the traditional boundaries that separate fields of science.

Erica K. Brockmeier

Diving into code to illuminate the history of computing
Person poses, sitting on a staircase

Stephanie Dick’s work explores the history of science, philosophy, and mathematics. “I think my whole academic career has been triangulating between those three different fields in various ways,” she says.

 

Diving into code to illuminate the history of computing

Stephanie Dick delves deep into the practice of computer programming and design to shed light on different communities’ attempts to automate reason, knowledge, and proof.

Katherine Unger Baillie