September 5, 2019

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THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2019 VOL. CXXXV

NO. 35

THE INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA

FOUNDED 1885

Greek life director Jazmyn Pulley steps down after one year The position of OFSL director is now vacant MADDY STROHM & ASHLEY AHN Staff Reporters

The director of the Office of Fraternity and Sorority life for

the past school year, Jazmyn Pulley, has left the position. OFSL is currently without a director and is being temporarily led by Associate Vice Provost for Student Affairs Tamara Greenfield K ing. Pulley assumed the postion in July 2018 after a

six-month search for a new director and left in April, according to her LinkedIn profile. She wrote in an email that she is “not comfortable” commenting on the reasons for her departure at this time. At the time of P ulley’s

appointment, OFSL had experienced frequent turnovers in the staff leadership over the past several years, then-Intercultural Greek Council president Rio Dennis said. At the beginning of last school year, Pulley said in an interview with The Daily

Pennsylvanian that she was looking forward to sticking around for a while. “That is my goal — just to stay here as long as possible and really give it my all because I SEE PULLEY PAGE 2

Jazmyn Pulley

Penn launches new major in design

GRAPHIC BY JESS TAN

Leaders of minority groups urge UA to promote diversity GRANT BIANCO Staff Reporter

Student groups are firing back at Penn Law School professor Amy Wax’s recent controversial comments and advocating for more diversity initiatives

in response. Several undergraduate student groups have argued that Wax’s remarks on immigration have endangered students from marginalized backgrounds, referencing her remarks at the National Conservatism Conference and in a subsequent interview with The New Yorker. The leaders of several undergradu-

ate minority associations said they believed Wax’s comments were outrageous, but did not think she could be terminated because of her status as a tenured professor. However, they are urging the Undergraduate Assembly to take other steps to address prejudice on campus. SEE WAX PAGE 3

Transfer students now have a reserved seat on the UA Elections for the fall will start Sept. 16 and end Sept. 18 CONOR MURRAY Staff Reporter

The Nominations and Elections Committee will oversee a unique election cycle for the Undergraduate Assembly and Class Boards this fall, adding a new seat for transfer students as well as overseeing a special election for vacant Engineering seats on the UA. The election is the first in which a New Student Representative seat on the UA will be reserved specifically for a new transfer student, said Elizabeth Vinton, a Wharton senior and NEC vice chair of elections. Instead of nine seats reserved for new students in general, there will now be eight seats reserved for Penn freshmen and one for a transfer student. If no transfer students decide to run, then the seat will instead go to a freshman. The policy was passed earlier this year, when the NEC added the transfer student seat amendment to its Fair Practices Code. The code outlines the procedures for all student government elections at Penn. The NEC will also be holding a special election to fill four vacant Engineering seats on the UA. In the spring 2019 UA and Class Board elections, no students formally declared their candidacy for the five Engineering seats on the UA. Only one student, Engineering sophomore Kshitiz Garg, ran a successful write-in cam-

Instead of nine seats reserved for new students in general, the new policy states there will now be eight seats reserved for freshmen and one for a transfer student. paign, achieving the minimum number of required votes to secure a spot on the ballot. Garg won his seat on the UA with 98 votes. The election will follow the same timeline as the new student elections, and will be open to Engineering sophomores, juniors, and seniors. Last spring, the NEC implemented a number of new initiatives to boost voter turnout, including discounts at local businesses and the implementation of voting booths. This year, Vinton hopes to expand these projects and find ways to

OPINION | U. turns back on students in need “Penn needs radical and immediate changes to the process by which they support students through addiction, recovery, and relapses.” PAGE 4

SPORTS | A Fresh Start for Men’s Soccer

Penn hopes to improve on last season’s average of 0.75 goals scored per game, most of which came from set pieces BACKPAGE

FOLLOW US @DAILYPENN FOR THE LATEST UPDATES ONLINE AT THEDP.COM

reach out specifically to the transfer and Engineering communities. Vinton said the new transfer seat on the UA “doesn’t mean anything if we don’t utilize it and get the word out.” She said although there is no email listserv for new transfer students, she will submit an email to the Office of Student Affairs to be sent to the freshman and sophomore class listservs encouraging new transfer students to run. She also plans to reach out to transfer students SEE TRANSFERS PAGE 6

CAROLINE GIBSON

The new 16-credit B.A. design program was developed by the College of Arts and Sciences and the Stuart Weitzman School of Design.

The fine arts major has also been revamped GORDON HO Staff Reporter

Penn undergraduate students can now major in design for the first time starting this semester. The new 16-credit B.A. program was developed by the College of Arts and Sciences and the Stuart Weitzman School of Design. Penn has also launched a revamped fine arts major for students in the College of Arts and Sciences and the School of Engineering and Applied Science. Department leaders said students had asked for more streamlined course offerings for fine arts, resulting in the updated major. Students studying design will develop skills in contemporary representation, prototyping, and fabrication. The fine arts major, which is updated from the previous existing major, will offer various studio courses in animation and 3D modeling, drawing and painting, photography, sculpture, and performance. The curricula will incorporate theme-based projects to allow students to develop a comprehensive understanding of the contemporary challenges that modern societies face, said Orkan Telhan, a professor of fine arts who helped develop the new major. While students from the Wharton and Nursing schools will not be able to pursue the fine arts and design majors, all undergraduates across the University will be able to take courses inside the program as electives or for a six-credit fine arts minor, said Kristen Giannantonio, assistant director for administration of the undergraduate program in fine arts and design. Matt Neff, the director of the undergraduate program in fine arts and design, said the effort to create the new design major

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and update the fine arts major had been in the works for several years. Various departments such as the Department of Historic Preservation, Art History, City and Regional Planning, and Landscape Architecture coordinated to create ideas for the design curriculum. The committee eventually decided that the Fine Arts Department was structurally big enough to host the new undergraduate major in design, Neff said. The involvement of multiple departments ensured that the new design program will offer an interdisciplinary approach that allows students to tackle today’s environmental and cultural challenges, Telhan said. “You are making a more integrative curriculum,” Telhan said. “You’d rather work on more complex problems that are environmental, social, or cultural, whether it’s related to climate change, environmental pollution, or if you really want to do social advocacy, deal with social injustice.” The committee designed the curriculum to offer students opportunities to work with different themes through media, Telhan said. “It’s a very major rethinking about how design education should be. It’s not like you go and learn how to become a graphic designer,” Telhan said. “You learn how to become a designer who can use visual design skills in your projects.” The department hopes that the new undergraduate design major will set the University apart from other colleges due to the wider reach of Penn’s major. “We make it very open so that you can have a design major, but then you can jump to many different fields because it would give you a very good background,” Telhan said. “It’s really a liberal arts version of design education.”

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