Espousing—and acting on—Penn’s highest ideals.
By Interim President J. Larry Jameson
There is a distinctive sound that occurs around campus with some regularity. I hear it from my College Hall office, just as I did throughout my years leading Penn Medicine. For most people, this noise hums in the background, registering as little more than a momentary interruption in conversation on Locust Walk or causing a brief pause during Commencement celebrations on Franklin Field. You may even recall hearing it during your own time at Penn.
It is the overhead roar of a PennSTAR Flight helicopter taking off or touching down at the Hospital of the University Pennsylvania. Every hour of every day and every day of the year, the PennSTAR team is on call for critical care flights that have made a life-or-death difference for tens of thousands of patients.
That Penn and society would develop and devote such resources toward preserving an individual life is, on reflection, a remarkable evolution. When Penn was still a young institution, there were those devoted to healing the ill and injured, laying the foundation for this profound commitment. After all, we are deeply proud to claim the nation’s first medical school and its first hospital, home to significant leaps forward in medical science and healthcare.
Yet, at that point in the late 18th century, the idea that an individual’s life and wellbeing were moral ends unto themselves was still something of a novel theory. It had been articulated in documents like the Declaration of Independence and the writings of Immanuel Kant but not at all universally applied.
The values were there, but the technical means for achieving them and their broadening adoption—these tools and aspirations advanced over centuries. Today, we place historically unprecedented emphasis on saving a life, educating a student, and excellence across a staggering range of life-improving research and service. Each time that helicopter soars overhead, it is a modern incarnation of Penn’s longstanding values, manifestly in action.
In our rapidly changing world, there comes a time when institutions must freshly articulate their values, even if those values have been widely, if implicitly, understood and embraced for hundreds of years. Such was the case for Penn, and early last fall we did just that, with our statement of University Values, which reads in part:
We embrace excellence, freedom of inquiry and expression, and respect. Penn’s culture is inspired by its founder, Benjamin Franklin—open-minded and curious, inventive and practical, exhibiting brilliance across fields, imperfect but self-improving, and relentlessly focused on enhancing social good.
Advancing discovery and opportunity toward a better future for all. Excellence, freedom of inquiry and expression, and respect. Inspired by our founder’s example of being open-minded and curious, inventive and practical, brilliant across fields, self-improving and focused on enhancing social good.
These values capture in words the ethos that has animated Penn throughout its long history. We wrote them down so that the world knows what Penn strives to achieve and how we strive to achieve it. But, as our people demonstrate every day across campus, there is the act of espousing our values, and then there is the work of living them. A selection of milestones and achievements this academic year exemplify our values in action.
We officially dedicated critical capital projects such as Amy Gutmann Hall, Penn’s interdisciplinary home for data science, and the Jane and David Ott Center for Track & Field, a state-of-the-art indoor facility that is the first of its kind in Philadelphia, and which provides another gateway to access our campus. These enhancements reflect Penn’s investment in cutting-edge spaces that enable bold ideas, creative collaboration, and community.
We were pleased to announce appointments for two new leadership roles: celebrated climate expert Michael Mann has been named Penn’s inaugural Vice Provost for Climate Science, Policy, and Action; and leading music professor Timothy Rommen is our University’s inaugural Vice Provost for the Arts. They will lead, coordinate, and elevate the visibility of these strategic goals at Penn. We also announced the Penn AI Council, a group of five faculty who will lead the effort to coordinate and strengthen Penn’s breadth of AI expertise. Together with the new Draw Down the Lightning Grants and expanded nonpartisan engagement through Penn Washington, we are furthering Penn’s highest strategic priorities.
The 2024 David and Lyn Silfen University Forum, “‘Waging Peace’: Dialogue and Diplomacy in the Middle East,” showcased how Penn engages with challenging and complex issues through the lens of our academic missions. We enjoyed an engaging discussion with former Israeli Ambassador Itamar Rabinovich and former Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, and attendance for the event was robust.
The launch of the Office of Religious and Ethnic Inclusion—the first of its kind nationally—along with enhanced campus-wide training initiatives, has significantly advanced our commitment to countering hate, deepening understanding, and cultivating a truly inclusive and welcoming community. It will further strengthen our commitment to the principles embodied in the Office of Civil Rights Title VI legislation.
We were also deeply proud to announce the expansion of financial aid for middle-income families, a continuation of Penn’s leadership in opening doors to outstanding educational opportunities for the most talented students from all backgrounds.
As Penn marked these milestones, we celebrated exceptional honors for faculty and students. We are thrilled that Dorothy Roberts, the George A. Weiss Professor of Law and Raymond Pace & Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander Professor of Civil Rights, was named a 2024 MacArthur Fellow, a well-deserved global recognition. We are also elated that Penn Engineering fourth-year student Om Gandhi was awarded a 2025 Rhodes Scholarship.
Early in the new year, I will be on the road and traveling abroad to meet with alumni in a number of countries and cities. I look forward to hearing from our global alumni community, strengthening ties, and sharing how Penn’s values and actions align.
At any given moment, tens of thousands of people throughout the University and health system are living Penn’s highest ideals. We are educating future generations, making paradigm-changing discoveries and contributions to knowledge, and caring for and saving patients’ lives. When you hear a hum around campus, it may be a PennSTAR helicopter, or an AI server, or an orchestra tuning their instruments—these, and many others, are the sounds and signs of Penn living its values.
Following the example of our founder, we articulate and act on our values not only for individual improvement. We do so toward a better future for all. I call this our “values proposition,” and Penn is leading the way.
