November 19, 2014

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THE INDEPENDENT STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA | WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 2014

ADVICE FROM PENN’S BEST INSTRUCTORS Fifteen Title IX complaints filed against Penn since 2002 HARRY COOPERMAN City News Editor

Fifteen Title IX complaints have been filed against Penn since 2002, although federal officials did not find against the University in any of the cases, according to recently released data. The data was obtained by the Harvard Crimson through a Freedom of Information Act request and published Tuesday night. According to the Crimson’s database, the Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights found that seven of the complaints filed against Penn lacked sufficient detail to find that Penn had discriminated against someone because of their gender and one allegation lacked sufficient evidence. The most recent allegation against Penn was filed on Jan. 13, 2014, and was resolved on March 6, 2014. The Office

ESTHER YOON / STAFF WRITER The School of Arts and Sciences wants to know what students think makes a good teacher. Nominations opened this week for the 2015 SAS Teaching Awards, a set of awards given to professors and TAs who go beyond the call of duty in their roles. The Daily Pennsylvanian asked past winners to sound off on what they think constitutes exceptional teaching.

Practicability Justin Bleich, a statistics TA and 2013 award winner mentioned the importance of keeping the material not only relevant but also useful for post-college life. “I taught from the perspective of wanting to build a toolbox that [students] can take out in the real world,” he explained. “I realized that most students aren’t going to take more statistics courses so how can I give a toolset to all these kids?”

Personability “I think I have always felt it was really important to bring knowledge and hard thinking to class so that I am really not that concerned with being popular in class,” Timothy Corrigan, a 2014 award winner, said. But Corrigan said that even in his larger lectures he strives to learn the names of all his students. “This is so that the class becomes about me knowing who you are, knowing your work, knowing what your strengths and weaknesses are,” Corrigan said. “There’s a really important personal dimension to [teaching] as well.”

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OPINION HAVE SOME FAITH Why public school students have the right to practice religion PAGE 4

SPORTS PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY YOLANDA CHEN & EMILY CHENG

UNDONE BY RIDER

Debate team, PETA clash over animal experimentation

For students in Palestine, a tough path to graduation

The debate took place at Huntsman Hall on Tuesday CLARE CONNAUGHTON Contributing Writer BACK PAGE

One student group is ‘Ready for Hillary’ JONATHAN BAER Staff Writer

While Democrats lost the senate in the midterm elections, Democratic students have a plan for how to keep the White House in 2016: Hillary Clinton. Penn Ready for Hillary, a student-led group that was formed at the beginning of the semester, has become an active political group on campus. The group acts as a campus representative of Ready for Hillary, a national super political action committee that raises and spends money in an effort to elect Clinton in 2016, if she decides to run. “This organization is completely centered around action,” College sophomore and Penn for Hillary’s Director of External Affairs Paul-Julien Burg said. “Penn for Hillary is really an organization to promote being engaged in politics. It’s also making sure that the SEE READY FOR HILLARY PAGE 3

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DAVID CAHN Contributing Writer

Did you know that over 365,000 animals are used in experiments at Penn? On Tuesday evening, a crowd of Penn students gathered in Huntsman Hall to hear the University of Pennsylvania Speech and Debate team argue in favor of animal experimentation at Penn. Their opponents? Justin Goodman, the Director of Laboratory Investigations at PETA, and Aysha Akhtar,the author of Animals and Public Health: Why Treating Animals Better is Critical to Human Welfare. Goodman talked about and showed pictures of experiments that took place at

while research is acceptable, experimentation is not. “If you volunteer for a clinical

This week’s meeting of Students for Justice in Palestine began as usual. Students ate falafel and chatted in English, Arabic and even Spanish. I sat next to Jane Wu who, like many of the students I spoke with over the course of the evening, had heard about the event online and decided to attend because “we don’t really get to see as many really personal experiences from people on the ground” in Palestine. The evening’s guests were Hala Khalil and Ahmad Shwieke, two Palestinian students from Birzeit University,

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GARETT NELSON/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

PETA Director of Laboratory Investigations Justin Goodman takes the podium in opposition of animal testing. PETA is widely known for its radical stance on the use of animals in research.

Penn like testing cocaine addiction in rats, the effect of vision loss on dogs and invasive brain experiments on primates.

Akhtar, who also works at the Food and Drug Administration, argued that there is a difference between research and experimentation, and

A fast track to $1 million for your social start-up Hult Prize challenges teams to find solutions for urban education EMILY OFFIT Staff Writer

Registration for the 2015 Hult Prize, the world’s largest student start-up incubator, has just come to a close. Now the

teams, who are eligible for a $1 million prize, must race to come up with a solution to this year’s challenge.

The 2015 challenge asks teams of five to create a sustainable and adaptable model that poses a solution to the early childhood education gap for children from birth to age six. Contestants vying for the Hult Prize can be from any age group, from undergraduate freshman to alumnae.

Campus director for the Hult Prize and Engineering sophomore Molly Wang believes that this prize is not only unique for its sizeable monetary reward. “The cool part is not only that the end prize is $1,000,000, which is way bigger than other social impact

Celebrate Life’s Simple Pleasures Month After Month

competition,” Wang said. “It’s giving people real incentive to look at how a business can be profitable but also work toward a greater social good.” Wang also hopes that this collaborative opportunity will bring together the Penn comSEE HULT PAGE 5

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November 19, 2014 by The Daily Pennsylvanian - Issuu