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Jul | Aug 2026
Vol. 124, No. 6
Features
City Limits
JJ Tiziou has been walking around the city of Philadelphia for a decade. Now he wants everybody else to join him.
By Trey Popp
LDI and American Healthcare
The interdisciplinary experts at Penn’s Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics have seen a lot since LDI was created after the passage of Medicare and Medicaid in the 1960s, but nothing quite like the challenges roiling the US healthcare system now.
By Mary Ann Meyers
The 30-Year Squat
Three decades ago a “ragtag army of squatter-minded poets” took possession of a modest cottage at 38th & Locust Walk and conjured by candlelight a vision of a “house for writers.” Today Kelly Writers House is a University institution that hosts a dizzying variety of classes, readings, and other events and sits at the center of a constellation of affiliated programs whose impact stretches around the globe. But in a lot of ways it hasn’t changed at all. Plus: ModPo’s story in The Classroom and the Crowd.
By John Prendergast
Alumni Weekend 2026
Our annual photo gallery.
By Tommy Leonardi
Departments
From the Editor | Walking around, making a home, fixing healthcare.
Letters | Cover issue, bridge views, remembered friends, and more.
Views
Notes from the Undergrad | Lost lawn, lost dream?
Alumni Voices | Of “banana whackies” and voting rights.
Elsewhere | Road trip gone wrong (whew!).
Expert Opinion | How radiology shows the limits and potential of AI.
Gazetteer
Commencement | Historian’s advice to Class of 2026: Be like FDR.
AI and Society | Maybe don’t depend on chatbots for real estate advice.
Genetics | Study reveals pattern in Neanderthal–Homo sapiens interbreeding.
Honors | Winners of the 2026 President’s Prizes announced.
Honors | Gene therapy for a form of blindness wins Breakthrough Prize.
Music | Irvine Auditorium’s Curtis Organ is 100 years old.
Sports | Doubles threat Manfredi Graziani W’26 and Aaron Sandler W’27.
Gift | $20 million to boost financial aid for middle-income families.
Arts
Calendar
Visual Art | Bird-loving collaboration in “Field Notes: Learning to See.”
Sculpture | Richard Ulevitch Gr’71’s “hunt” for finely carved African spoons.
Nonfiction | What the trial of Bernie Goetz meant and means. Five Bullets.
Briefly Noted
Alumni
Matthew Seneca C’99 is one to tango.
Chris Belland W’70 tells the nation’s story at Historic Tours of America.
John Ternus EAS’97 was named Apple’s next CEO.
Old Penn | The man who made the spoons for the “Spoon men.”
