How a reno killed the radio star

C.H.’S SPIN |Student-run radio is a quintessential part of the college experience that is about to be erased

To protect WQHS, the station has petitioned for a temporary relocation provided by the University.

Their Change.org petition amassed over 500 signatures, but Penn has not yet budged on its initial stance despite taking heat from listeners and student radio show hosts alike. One more signature could mean the difference between live music or white noise, given that this is far from the first time that they have had issues. “There has been a lack of communication between the radio station and Penn for years,” Wagner admitted.

Just last year, Penn left her and other broadcasters without a key to access the station for a month — an entire month off the air because they could not unlock the door. This instance adds to the list of difficulties that have plagued Penn’s only student-run radio since the loss of their broadcasting tower to a storm about 20 years ago.

Penn’s 24/7 student-run radio station WQHS currently operates in the

Center, but will lose access to the space for a year starting in April.

“Love is Fury” blemishes the subdued blue wallpaper in blockish, dark text. Posters hang loosely from the same wall, accompanied by a white board filled with incoherent scribbles and anecdotes dating back to the early 2000s. Albums ranging from bonus track LPs to brief EPs lean against CDs. The live music studio, record archives, meeting room, and broadcasting booth only occupy a small section of the Hollenback Center, but this station makes up for the lack of space with an overwhelming rush of personalized comfort and character. Giselle Wagner, a College junior and the station manager, described it best as “a place where individuals can rely on creative expression and escape from the pressures of Penn.” However, escape may no longer be an option. Wagner detailed that on Jan. 25, with no prior warning, Office of Student Affairs Associate Director Rodney Robinson told her that West Quad Hill Superblock would lose access to their space from April 2023 to April 2024. The Hollenback Center would be undergoing HVAC renovations for an entire year, and with no alternative home for the station, Penn will be left in radio silence.

Not everyone is a radio enjoyer, especially now that Apple Music and Spotify promise exactly what you want to hear whenever you want to hear it, but WQHS and stations like it offer you a new sound that streaming services rarely show you. Instead of losing yourself in your favorite song or the same old artist that you have grown to love, you can explore college radio and see what is out there. Podcasts and talk shows also make their rounds on the 24-hour stream, so there is never a lull on air.

Feel free to be un-fun

These newest renovations to the building, which houses WQHS and NROTC, will not only take student voices and music off the air but will also jeopardize the equipment and artwork that gives the space its instant appeal. Evie Klein, College junior and station outreach director, asked, “What are we going to do with this stuff? Put it in a storage locker and broadcast from there? I mean, come on.” Turntables, amps, desktop computers, and hundreds of valuable albums and CDs will be left without a home. Leaving them there is a risk that no one would take, but currently, there is no alternative.

“Another thing I’m nervous about is that they’ll take the walls down and put insulation in because that was a big part of the renovation as well,” Wagner said.

For reference, the drop ceiling panels of the room have fallen apart in recent years due to water damage. When it rains, the room suffers from various leaks, and anyone visiting the station can find a perfect view of the roof and entire HVAC system by looking through a gaping hole in the ceiling. WQHS, without a doubt, needs repairs supplied by Penn, but is this the right way to go about the issue? Kicking out an entire student group who are considering paths in entertainment and radio?

Klein also understood that the building is in need of repair, but questioned the timing of it all. “The fact that this building has reached this state where there’s a giant hole in the ceiling at Penn is insane.”

She joked, “Imagine if that happened at Huntsman where an escalator stops working for 10 minutes, and they have three mechanics working on it. You could just use stairs!”

The administration and college radio have had a rocky history since the latter took root in the 1970s. This memorandum against WQHS marks a near-historic low for relations between the two, and anyone associated with Penn who appreciates music in any capacity should recognize this moment as a call to action. For a school which stresses students with preprofessionalism, stripping away a possible career interest or creative comfort in music cannot go ignored.

WQHS needs its rights protected and its facilities enhanced, not just repaired. For any music listener, enjoyer, performer, or even partier, take part in student radio. If you have an underground music taste or simply play “Mr. Brightside” on repeat, you can support others who do the same. Maybe listen to different radio shows, look at the blog, or ask to join the team yourself — they are always looking for new faces. Maybe you could spread the word or lay the groundwork for a new radio tower and FM frequency license. Wagner encourages that WQHS “introduces you to new music, new stories, new perspectives just like any other broadcasting station, and I think we are the future of broadcasting.” You can show Penn that music matters. If not, it might simply disappear.

C.H. HENRY is a College sophomore studying communication and diplomatic history from Nashville, Tenn. His email address is chhen@ sas.upenn.edu.

DEAR PENN |

Set boundaries and work like the French do Coworker happy hours. Team retreats. Networking dinners.

Are “optional” employee bonding events ever really optional?

In the post-COVID-19-pandemic world, boundaries are increasingly blurred between work and life. While working from home allows for greater flexibility (and a casual dress code), it makes it difficult to sequester work from personal relationships. Work-life balance — or rather, imbalance — is in part due to what Penn students are all too familiar with from internships and preprofessional clubs: frequent after-hours get-togethers and coworker socialization.

Here in the United States, after-hours work events are a particularly pressing problem. We consistently fail to crack the top 10 of best countries to work in, likely due to our rampant workaholic culture. The work-life imbalance isn’t a universal problem, however. Across the Atlantic, French labor laws staunchly disagree with the American idea of casual coworker mingling.

France, a country known for its pro-worker policies, recently ruled in favor of what was called “the right not to be fun at work.” This ground-breaking ruling sets a precedent for setting boundaries between work relationships and personal friendships.

The plaintiff in this case, referred to as Monsieur T., successfully sued his employer for wrongful termination. He claimed that his termination was in part due to his refusal to join in on after-hours team events. To Monsieur T.’s employer, participation was necessary for building a strong workplace culture. French courts disagreed, writing that workers have a right to workplace dignity: self-respect, autonomy, and well-being.

In other words: French employees have a right to be un-fun.

This ruling runs antithetical to our culture in the United States. Here, there is immense pressure

The

to succumb to workaholism and treat after-hours events as mandatory. Yet, are we forgetting about our right to workplace dignity? Can we really turn down these pseudo-mandatory work events?

In employers’ defense, some good can come from team bonding events. Organizational behavior researchers tout the benefits of team bonding events: increased productivity, strengthened interpersonal relationships, even happiness. From casual happy hours to catered formal dinners, these events provide an opportunity to converse with coworkers in a more casual setting. Employers see after-hours events as a valuable opportunity to humanize their fellow coworkers.

It also pays off to be fun at work — it is often good for your career. Networking can lead to an offer, promotion, or bonus. Particularly at the beginning of one’s career, who you know pays off. Strong relationships with higher-ups could be the deciding factor in a return offer. This is why interns are particularly prone to the pressure of saying yes to networking events. You won’t find an eager Whartonite, on the hunt for a return offer, saying no to an after-hours dinner.

Young workers bear the brunt of the burden of pseudo-mandatory events, as there is a fine line between fun and employer-sanctioned misery. Constantly pushing your boundaries leads to burnout, decreased productivity, and job dissatisfaction.

There are many reasons to turn down an invite to a post-work happy hour, particularly if you’re a member of a marginalized group. For example, women are particularly vulnerable to after-hours events gone wrong. The New Yorker, in a piece entitled “Are After-Work Drinks a Conspiracy Against Women?,” argued that women bear the burden of unpaid coworker mingling. Sexism and harassment are not uncommon at casual after-work events.

In the pressure cooker that is Penn, it’s easy to forget that we possess the power to choose what we do and how we spend our lives. While it’s difficult, you have some autonomy in setting boundaries between work and life. To take a page from the French: you have a right to not be fun.

While saying “no” to a catered dinner closes the door on networking opportunities, one has the power to make that choice. You don’t need to sacrifice sanity for a forty-minute conversation over drinks in a crowded bar.

As Adam Grant, Penn’s prominent organizational behavior researcher, recently said on social media, “Choosing not to attend an unpaid work event doesn’t reveal the absence of loyalty. It reflects the presence of other priorities.” He’s right; you’re allowed to make yourself a priority. While

School should drop out of MBA rankings

conspired to deceive students, faculty, applicants, donors, and other stakeholders into paying tuition and making donations with the belief that the school had achieved a legitimately high ranking. However, Porat had in fact submitted false information to third parties.

Wharton is in a unique position to set a precedent in dropping out of business school rankings, given its reputation as one of the most sought-after business schools in the world. Such a decision by an inarguably powerful voice in higher education would be seen as a bold statement not only about the limitations of rankings, but also against the atmosphere of elitism that characterizes many investment banks, consulting firms, and private equity firms. These industries seek to recruit a disproportionate number of graduates from “target schools” like Wharton, which in turn consist of a disproportionate number of students from extremely wealthy and wellconnected backgrounds. Students who are not at “target schools” can often face an uphill battle in these specific industries during the recruitment process, so the cards may already be stacked against them no matter how skilled they are or how hard they work.

DESIGN BY WEI-AN JIN connections matter, a strong work-life balance will serve you better in the long run. An afterhours event is not the end-all-be-all. There are other ways to invest in yourself, from building social capital to protecting your mental health. Networking dinners and after-hours cocktails often feel like an obligation, but the French (and Adam Grant) are right. It might not be easy to say no, but one has the right to workplace dignity. It’s your choice in how you spend your time after hours. the trajectory of applicants’ academic and professional goals.

FIONA MILLER is a Wharton junior studying behavioral economics and social impact from Roanoke, Va. Her email is fimiller@wharton. upenn.edu.

So what are some alternatives to rankings? One method to assess the quality of business school programs is to gather feedback and data from employers, which can provide valuable insight into the skills and competencies of business school graduates. This can enable business schools to identify the strengths and weaknesses of a program, instead of catering to the confusing methodologies implemented by third-party rankings.

To gather employer feedback, business schools can conduct surveys, organize focus groups, and gather data from exit interviews of former employees who were alumni of such schools. This information and the strengths and weaknesses identified within can then be used to improve the quality of various programs and ensure that business schools are proactively meeting the wants and needs of employers, while also keeping up with trends in the labor market. This also enables business schools to divert resources away from short-term efforts to boost rankings and toward long-term innovation such as the programs and opportunities that are offered.

U.S. News & World Report. Forbes. Poets&Quants. The Financial Times. Bloomberg. Fortune. What do these sites all have in common?

Business school rankings.

Over the past few months, one highly-ranked law school after another, including the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, have announced their intentions to quit law school rankings. This trend has also manifested in top medical schools, including Penn’s Perelman School of Medicine which joined a mass exodus from medical school rankings.

But what about business schools? What about the Wharton School, which is one of the top-ranked business schools in the U.S. News rankings list?

The methodologies for ranking business schools are inherently flawed. There has been a disappearance of more quantitative data points, such as GMAT and GRE scores, since several schools declared that they are testoptional. Furthermore, as business schools continue to offer unique programs, build educational partnerships, and make their admissions processes more holistic, rankings have become increasingly arbitrary, while fostering a culture of elitism in education.

Furthermore, there is the question of integrity and transparency surrounding data, especially given that such an obsession over rankings can create incentives for colleges and universities to report flawed and misleading data. This already had serious legal ramifications.

Case in point: Moshe Porat, the former dean of the Richard J. Fox School of Business and Management at Temple University, was sentenced to 14 months in prison and a $250,000 fine in March 2022. The charges? He

Some may argue that such a move by Wharton may not have much of an impact on how applicants and employers view Wharton’s prestige, an argument that certainly has merit. However, it is also worth noting the consistent trends that have arisen with other graduate programs abandoning school rankings. Yale Law School and Harvard Medical School both led the way in refusing to supply data to rankings organizations any longer, and other top programs followed suit, dropping out one by one like dominoes.

Additionally, it is important to consider that the companies behind these rankings often do not have expertise in law, medicine, and business, so their methodologies for broadly ranking programs have no academic basis. Therefore, dropping out of these rankings is showing defiance of unscientific comparisons that can dictate

As one of the world’s preeminent business schools, Wharton is in a unique position to buck the trend of rankings-driven competition between universities. Some may be optimistic and others skeptical about the level of impact such a decision would have, but it would nevertheless bring forward a serious conversation about taking that additional step toward combating elitism in higher education.