The Work of a Generation
Once hailed as a “landmark” achievement, alumnus and Penn English professor Robert Spiller’s Literary History of the United States now feels not just dated but fundamentally misguided. What happened?
Hope is Part of the Plan
Paralyzed from the neck down by a gunshot wound in 2011, Kevin Neary C’04 can’t help imagining that someday a medical miracle might allow him to walk again.
Good Returns
The dangers and rewards of giving more than you get. An excerpt from Give and Take by Wharton professor Adam Grant. Plus: Interview with the author.
The Purple Passion of Michael Smerconish
Can an unpredictably centrist talk-show host with a yen for “nothing” really have an impact on the national discourse?
Glen Berger’s Amazing Spider-Man Experience
What happens when a playwright best known for a one-man show about a seriously overdue library book gets involved in creating a blockbuster musical about an iconic superhero? In one word: Kapow!
Alumni Weekend 2013
Our annual photo essay.
Going Global
Penn has a longstanding commitment to global engagement, dating all the way back to Ben Franklin.
Seeds of a Quiet Revolution
Lots of aid projects in the developing world provide materials—from latrines to laptops—but little in the way of involvement or input for the people they are supposed to benefit. In Nicaragua a group of Penn alumni, faculty, and students are trying a different approach.
The Spy Who Owned the Yankees
Alumnus Michael Burke’s life reads like an adventure story—
several of them, actually.
On a Roll
How the Penn alumnus behind Humanistic Robotics, Inc. is saving the world one landmine at a time—and making money doing it.
Practically Subversive
Showtime CEO Matt Blank has used boundary-pushing programming, cutting-edge marketing, and smart management to build his cable network into a national powerhouse.
Big Finish, Fresh Start
Penn’s Making History campaign has exceeded expectations, raising $4.3 billion and “catapulting” the University “from excellence to eminence.”
Constructing a New Kahn
Louis Kahn had more or less completed his designs for Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park when he died in 1974. It finally opened last fall to glowing reviews—but it could easily have been a disaster. Or nothing.
The Nora Network
The Nora Magid Mentorship Prize has been giving former students of the legendary nonfiction-writing teacher an excuse to get together and swap war stories—and helping to launch a new generation of Penn students into careers in journalism.
MOOC U.
Does the rise of the “massive open online course” spell the end of the university as we know it?
Stopping the Clock?
Will the mainstreaming of egg freezing offer women more choice about when to have children—kind of like the Pill in reverse—or delude them with a false sense of security?
Working Like Dogs
The new Penn Vet Working Dog Center will breed and train the country’s top detection dogs, but Center founder and director Cindy Otto’s sweeping vision doesn’t stop there.
Home Depot Syndrome, the Purple Squirrel, and America’s Job Hunt Rabbit Hole
As America strives to regain its economic footing, good people can’t find work even while companies struggle to find employees. How can this be happening?
The PATH to GO!
Penn alumni, students, and staff are at the forefront of a national movement to ensure that, if you’re gay and you play sports, you don’t have to be afraid.
The Art of Change
Charles Krause spent most of his career digging for stories. Now he’s finding—and exhibiting—artists whose work impacts the world.
Homecoming 2012
Football & Fun, Arts & Culture, Alumni Awards of Merit
Drone’s Day Scenarios
An invasion of unmanned aerial vehicles—drones to you—is on its way, but these flying robots are here to help, not enslave the human race. (At least, that’s what they say at Penn’s pioneering GRASP Lab, where some of the most sophisticated ones are being created.)
The Transformer
He turned an abandoned stretch of elevated rail tracks on Manhattan’s lower West Side from an eyesore to a treasured urban amenity, and put playing fields and green space where a garbage dump taller than the Statue of Liberty once sprawled. Now Penn Design alumnus and professor James Corner is creating a modern-day pleasure garden on the site of London’s Summer Olympics.
The Case of S. Weir Mitchell
He’s now remembered, if at all, for a misguided “rest cure” that inspired an iconic piece of early feminist fiction, but in his day alumnus and longtime University trustee S. Weir Mitchell found fame in several fields—as a noted surgeon and physician, a leading medical researcher, and a best-selling author.