Campus & Community

On Friday, Sept. 4, nearly 2,000 of the world’s top young computer scientists and engineers assembled in the bowl of the Wells Fargo Center. They were awaiting the start of PennApps, the world’s largest collegiate hackathon.

Pat Brennan’s job is largely about relationships. As director of Special Services in Penn's Division of Public Safety, Brennan calls on relationships with associates on Penn’s campus as well as her former colleagues at the Philadelphia Police Department to help support crime victims.

NEW ENGLAND: Jennifer Yu is a 19-year-old senior from Shrewsbury, Mass. An English major in the School of Arts and Sciences, Yu enrolled at Penn when she was 16 years old, having skipped two grades. “I never learned to write cursive,” she jokes. “It’s a bummer.”

Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter has called Pope Francis’ forthcoming trip “the largest event in the city’s modern history” and possibly “the second or third largest event in the history of the United States.” An estimated 2 million people are expected to travel to Philadelphia for the visit, more than doubling the city’s population.

The Penn Vet Working Dog Center (WDC) recently received an injection of cuteness—and talent. Five Labrador retriever puppies from the “Q litter” reported to the Center to start qualified training on Aug. 21, at exactly 8 weeks old.

Annie Stout held a special place in the hearts of students and faculty in the early years of the School of Dental Medicine, as well as for many years after she retired. After Stout and her husband Noah moved from Chester County to Philadelphia in 1866, they became caretakers of a dental professor’s Center City home and office.

As a member of Mask and Wig, Max Levy’s voice can be heard around the University of Pennsylvania campus, but the bass/baritone has performed to audiences outside of campus, including the prestigious Tanglewood Festival Chorus.

The National Science Foundation awarded the University of Pennsylvania’s Krishna P. Singh Center for Nanotechnology a five-year, $5 Million grant to establish the Mid-Atlantic Nanotechnology Hub for Research, Education, & Innovation.

On Thursday, Sept. 10, Penn President Amy Gutmann hosted the David and Lyn Silfen University Forum in Beijing, convening a panel of renowned figures in conversation on the roles of China and the United States in the world.

It’s not only physicians and nurses who can make a difference in health care. Sometimes it takes a history major and some careful observation to help effect positive change.