November 17, 2022

Vagelos MLS program sees low retention rates among first years

First years in the program take a total of five credits in their first semester, compared to the four credits that first year College students typically take

ELLA SOHN Contributing Reporter

While many students have welcomed the chal lenges and research opportunities that the Vagelos Scholars Program in the Molecular Life Sciences provides, several first years reported leaving the pro gram to pursue other paths.

In the Class of 2022, exactly half of the 46 stu dents who entered the program during their first semester at Penn graduated as Vagelos MLS schol ars. For the graduating class each year since 2015, the retention rate from those who originally entered the program has fluctuated from 35% to 51%.

Students who express interest in the physical sci ences on their applications are invited to join MLS upon admission to Penn. Over their first two years, they identify a major in physics, chemistry, bio physics, or biochemistry. By the end of their four years, another requirement mandates that they also complete a second major in the natural sciences or submatriculate into earning a master’s degree.

MLS is the oldest of three dual degree programs that have been created through donations from 1950 College graduate Roy Vagelos and his wife Diana. The Life Sciences & Management program com bines bioscience and business, while the Vagelos Integrated Program in Energy Research combines science and engineering.

Jeffery Saven, professor of chemistry and director of the MLS program, said that while the first year curriculum can seem rigid, it is largely due to the sequential nature of math and science coursework at Penn.

First years in the program take a total of five credits in their first semester, compared to the four credits that first-year College students typically take. The five classes are in physics, math, and chemistry, as well as a seminar focused on scientific writing.

“If you don’t set up things in the right way, and you want a particular career track in the natural

See VAGELOS, page 3

Men’s soccer wins Ivy title, kicks off NCAA Tournament tonight

men’s soccer will face off with Rutgers at Penn Park in the first round of the NCAA Tournament after clinching its first Ivy League Championship title since 2013

CALEB CRAIN, ALEXIS GARCIA,

PRINCETON, N.J. — For the first time since 2013, Penn men’s soccer is on top of the Ivy League.

The Quakers traveled to Princeton needing a win or tie to capture at least a part of the Ivy title. And they did just that, defeating the Tigers in a com manding 3-0 shutout. With the win, Penn clinched a spot in the NCAA tournament and will face off with Rutgers tonight at 7 p.m. at Penn Park. The Quak ers have not recorded a victory against the Scarlet Knights since 2002, going 0-4-1 in the most recent five matchups.

The winner of Thursday’s game will advance to the second round of the tournament, where it will

face No. 3 seed Syracuse on its home field on Sunday afternoon.

Penn’s defeat of Princeton brought the team to 6-1 in the Ivy League and to 12-2-2 on the season, the most wins the Quakers have had in a single season since 1973.

“It feels amazing. I’m really happy for the play ers,” coach Brian Gill said. “I think every single player in the group has given so much this season.”

This victory caps a stunning turnaround for the Quakers, who finished sixth in the Ivy League and notched only one conference win a year ago.

“I think we played well last year at times, and we

Over 4,000 Penn community members receive bivalent COVID-19 booster at University clinic

The clinic was open to the entire Penn community and their family members over the age of 16

JONAH MILLER Senior Reporter

Penn vaccinated over 4,000 community members during its November bivalent COVID-19 booster clinic.

just didn’t get some results,” Gill said. “I think that motivated us this year, and [we] wound up making critical plays in games like this.”

On Saturday, goals by senior midfielder Isaac Mc Ginnis and sophomore midfielder Charlie Gaffney, as well as sophomore defender Ben Do, coupled with a strong defense propelled Penn to victory.

“It hasn’t really sunk in yet,” Gaffney said follow ing the match. “I’m just trying to take it all in. It feels amazing, especially because of where we were last year.”

SOCCER , page 10

Penn Abroad adds seven new programs recently approved for credit in fall 2023

These new partnerships have been added over the past two years, some before and several during the COVID-19 pandemic

HALEY SON Contributing Reporter

Penn Abroad will offer seven new programs re cently approved for credit in fall 2023 as study abroad sessions for the semester.

Penn’s Democratic, Republican political groups oppose Trump’s 2024 presidential run

IMRAN SIDDIQUI Senior Reporter

While former United States President and 1968 Wharton graduate Donald Trump announced his third presidential campaign on Tuesday, Penn politi cal groups – on both sides of the spectrum – are not supporting his candidacy.

Trump made the announcement on Nov. 15 at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Palm Beach, Fla. In his speech, Trump spoke about his vision for America — reflecting on what he called the “successes” of his own time in office.

“We were a strong nation, and, more importantly, we were a free nation. But now we are a nation in decline,” Trump said during his announcement. “We are a failing nation for millions of Americans. The past two years under Joe Biden had been a time of pain, hardship, anxiety, and despair.”

In a statement to The Daily Pennsylvanian, Penn

College Republicans said the club believes that “Donald Trump is not best suited for the 2024 presi dential candidacy.” The statement said that the club would prefer “a younger, more qualified candidate who better embodies conservative values.”

“Last Tuesday’s results are indicative of the fact that the Republican Party has many other potential candidates who garner great support in their home states and are not overshadowed by the controver sial Trump presidency,” Penn College Republicans wrote.

Penn Democrats Membership Director and Col lege junior Leo Cassel-Siskind said that another term with Trump in office would be “an existential threat to our democracy” in a statement to the DP.

The booster clinic hosted by Wellness at Penn ran from Nov. 3 to Nov. 4 in Gimbel Gymnasium in Pot truck Health and Fitness Center. The two-day clinic marked Penn’s first COVID-19 booster initiative since January, when the University held a four-day clinic in partnership with SunRay Drugs, a local pharmacy.

Director of Communications for Student Wellness Mary Kate Coghlan told The Daily Pennsylvanian that 4,198 Pfizer mRNA bivalent COVID-19 booster shots were given out during the clinic.

The clinic was open to the entire Penn com munity and their families over the age of 16, and Coghlan said 61% of those who received a vaccine from the clinic were students. Of the 2,561 students who received the shot, 49% were undergraduates.

“We are thrilled that so many University com munity members attended the Penn Cares Booster Clinic, thus continuing to help keep Penn and our surrounding communities healthy and safe,” Chief Wellness Officer Benoit Dubé said.

Dubé said the bivalent mRNA booster is particu larly important because it reduces the chances of severe illness and hospitalization caused by the cur rent Omicron variants, in addition to the original strain of COVID-19.

As of the fall 2022 semester, Penn required all eligible community members to be fully vacci nated and have received at least one booster against COVID-19. The University mandated students to submit proof of vaccination to their Wellness Portal.

The partnerships — with the Ibero-American University of Mexico, CASA-Santiago, CIEE Cape Town, CET São Paulo, Paris School of Business, Stockholm School of Economics, and the University of Queensland — have been added over the past two years, some immediately before and several during the COVID-19 pandemic. Few students have had the opportunity to apply to these programs, and several of the programs will run for the first time this spring, according to Penn Abroad administrators.

The first step to study abroad is to go to the Penn Abroad office for a group advising session, which goes over the “nuts and bolts” of studying abroad, Deputy Director of Penn Abroad Kristyn Palmiotto said. These sessions will be held every Tuesday at 12 p.m. and Friday at 3 p.m., and students are required to reg ister beforehand.

Applicants will then have the option to attend an ad ditional region- or discipline-specific session, she said. Previously, students were required to attend a regionspecific session first.

“Our semester abroad programs are not fully back to where they were pre-pandemic, but we did expect this. With each semester, we’re increasing our num bers, and we expect to be back to where we were within a few years,” Palmiotto said. “We’ve seen [COVID-19 restrictions] lessening, but we’re also aware that winter is on the horizon, and things may change,” she added.

The newest partnership with the Ibero-American University in Mexico City was approved this past Feb ruary for Wharton and College credit.

“Students will live with host families, so this is a good program for students who want to practice their

PHOTO BY SAMANTHA TURNER

The men’s soccer team holds up the Edwin Henry Parkhurst III trophy, which recognizes its new title as Ivy League champions on Nov. 12.

Penn

& ESTHER LIM Sports Associates & Sports Editor

Wharton graduate and former President Donald Trump announced his third presidential campaign on Nov. 15

PHOTO BY JONAH CHARLTON

1968 Wharton graduate and former President Donald Trump at Johnstown, Pa. on Oct. 13, 2020.

College first year Bill Chen left the MLS program earlier this semester after his experience with the coursework.

“You

college career,” Chen said.

stages of

Saven said that one reason behind the structure of MLS is to develop a strong foundation for a career in research.

Students work in a Penn laboratory with a

stipend in the summers after their sophomore and junior years. According to the program website, the majority of students enter M.D., Ph.D., or M.D./ Ph.D. programs after graduation. Several students mentioned that this emphasis on research was an in centive to join MLS.

On the other hand, the research component was part of College senior Raman Thadani’s reason ing when he decided to leave the program. After spending his first two summers researching, Tha dani realized that he no longer wanted to pursue a Ph.D. or research after graduation. As a junior, if he remained in MLS, he would have to complete an ad ditional summer of research.

The choice became “either do something else you’re actually excited about or do another summer of research just so you can graduate with the MLS degree,” Thadani said.

Despite leaving the program, he is still on track to graduate with a master’s degree in physics this spring.

While Thadani’s plan to submatriculate has re mained the same, some students have changed their academic goals after making the decision to drop MLS.

“It’s very easy to do any of those things without having MLS as part of your bio,” she said.

Students who continued with the program re ported that despite some challenges, they decided that the advantages outweigh the drawbacks.

College sophomore Corina Nava said that she initially found it difficult to transition from online instruction in high school to the intense workload of in-person college courses.

After consulting with her advisor, she decided to stick with the program and take harder classes in fields she was interested in. In addition to her pas sion for science, Nava said that the support of her friends in the MLS program played a part in her de cision to stay in the program.

“I think I’ve been lucky in finding a very closeknit community,” she said.

College first year Shikhar Gupta echoed this sen timent, saying that the required courses also already aligned with his interest in biochemistry.

“It’s a challenge that I welcome,” he said. “It’s been manageable with the techniques I learned in high school and the way I manage my time.”

College first year Eric Lee said he was consider ing dropping the program until an upperclassman convinced him to stay.

“MLS pushes you and encourages you in that di rection,” Lee said. “So why not stick through with it and see how far you get?”

Saven emphasized that MLS is one of many paths at Penn that prepare students for careers in science.

“Science can be difficult, and exploring frontiers often requires depth of knowledge and experience in multiple disciplines,” he wrote in an email to The Daily Pennsylvanian. “But challenges are why I would hope students choose Penn — so that they can acquire new knowledge, skills, experiences, and ac complishments during their time here.”

Associate Director of Public Health and Wellbe ing Rebecca Huxta said that she found the number of students who came to the clinic “very encourag ing,” especially because the bivalent booster is not required by the University.

“It was very encouraging to see that students are still caring about their health, still caring about COVID-19, and still wanting to protect themselves and others by getting the updated booster,” Huxta said.

Community members who have not yet received their upgraded booster shot and missed the Wellness clinic can get their vaccine at nearby pharmacies, including CVS and Walgreens, Dubé said.

Executive Director of Student Health and Coun seling William Adelman said that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommend the bi valent booster shot in particular for individuals over the age of five, as long as it has been at least two months since a prior booster.

“What makes this shot a little bit different is that it is bivalent, so it includes not only the traditional booster for COVID-19, but it also includes coverage for the most prevalent variants that weren’t part of the original booster,” Adelman said, adding that it covers the two Omicron variants that are causing the vast majority of current COVID-19 cases.

Adelman said that since there might be a rise in COVID-19 cases over the winter during flu season, the best way to protect oneself is to receive the booster shot and the flu shot.

The booster clinic marked the third time the Uni versity used Gimbel Gymnasium as a vaccine clinic location this year. In January 2022, Penn held its first-round COVID-19 booster clinic from Jan. 14 to Jan. 19. More recently, in September 2022, the Uni versity held its annual flu clinic at Gimbel, where over 11,000 community members were vaccinated.

PHOTO BY ANGELA YE

In search of leadership

I n 1985, as protests against the apart heid regime in South Africa gathered steam across the world, universities like Cornell, where I was a graduate student, saw renewed attempts by students and faculty to get the administration and the trustees to divest from companies doing business there. As part of our campaign, I joined a large group of students who oc cupied Day Hall, the building that housed the central administration.

Many more students and faculty were gathered outside, and we pledged to remain in the building until the president and the board of trustees met with our leaders and allowed us to plead our case. It was a heady moment — we were doing the right thing, and, as it turned out, were on the right side of history! My euphoria did not last long, as two faculty mem bers, strong supporters of divestment, swooped into the building and walked me out. I was a foreign student, they said, and they had heard that agencies of the federal government (they might have used more impolitic terms!) were going to blunt these protests by targeting vul nerable students — those on a student visa, for instance.

I joined in the sloganeering outside and waited for the police. They arrived, and after a university spokesman de manded that the students leave (they cordially refused), the police moved in to eject the students. I watched as individ ual students insisted that (i) they would not walk out if escorted by a policeman

wearing a weapon, (ii) female students should be removed by female officers, and (iii) they would not walk out at all and needed to be carried out. (I do not remember anyone calling these students “snowflakes” then, but that moment was different from ours.)

To my great surprise, this is exactly what happened, as the harried officers there cleared the corridors of students, one by one, respecting their choices. I had not expected such a benign police response, but I realized then that the uni versity administration was sending the protestors a message: They were to be cleared, to be taken to the police station and their information recorded before they were released, but their right to non violent protest was respected. The police would be equally nonviolent, or at least as nonviolent as possible, during the pro cess of arrest.

I do not want to sugar-coat all that happened, as the administration did use backhoes to destroy the shantytown erected by the protestors in the main quad. Students were arrested there, too, but the campus judicial system withdrew charges later. This memory recurs as I think about the courageous and prin cipled Penn student members of Fossil Free Penn who camped out for weeks on Locust Walk (they have now taken down their tents) and interrupted the Penn-Yale Homecoming football game to demand that our university divest from all fossil fuel-related investments.

These students are activists address ing the most pressing planetary issue of our time, which is climate change (we should really be calling it “climate catastrophe”). Our administrators, and members of our board of trustees, should recognize that these students are showing us the way. They are lead ers — ethical, committed, and willing to risk punishment — acting to further the public good. And our administrators should match their leadership and com mitment. But Penn, which styles itself a model of excellence in all things, now brings up the pathetic rear, lagging far behind Harvard and other universities that have pledged to divest from fossil fuel investments.

Worse, various institutional entities, particularly the office of the Vice Provost for University Life, have made it their mission to launch repeated investigations of these students, and to do so in ways that have heightened the stress that the protestors deal with as they keep up with their demanding academic workload. Nor have officials of this office or others done anything to suggest that they recog nize that nonviolent protest, even when disruptive of football games or campus rituals, is crucial to the functioning of democracy, and certainly of universities as bastions of free speech.

Their free speech “observers” on the football field should have been mindful and caring in their response to student protest, and to monitor any attempts to

intimidate these students. But no such thing occurred — the game’s attendees instead functioned as partisans of the University administration rather than neutral observers who are meant to ensure that free speech rights are pro tected, even as students are warned and then arrested (if necessary). This puni tive attitude can be rectified if our senior administration makes clear that they rec ognize and value ethical and nonviolent protest, but we seem sorely to lack that leadership.

Back to Cornell: The trustees con vened a panel to meet the anti-apartheid protestors. I remember that they sat pa tiently for several hours listening to prepared speeches. I spoke, too, about Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., and their mobilization of common people to address the ravages of empire and of racism. I cannot claim that our speeches caused shifts in university policy, but that meeting demonstrated to me one way in which leaders of universi ties, makers of policy, can attend to those in our community who march ahead of us and remind us of our urgent political and ethical obligations.

kaul@upenn.edu.

After spending another Friday night feeling like I am rotting away in a Huntsman GSR, I, like so many other Penn students, am guilty of stumbling across the thought of, “Should I go into consulting?”

At Penn, more than 50% of the most recent graduating year entered work full time in either the financial (28.29%) or consulting industry (18.88%), even though Wharton consists of only 25% of the undergraduate body. With median starting salaries nearing six figures, names such as McKinsey & Company or Goldman Sachs Group Inc. are tossed around with such frequency you can’t help but be drawn into the snake’s den. While I have no interest in taking the trek up to Wall Street, I am intrigued yet alarmed by the numbers.

Why are so many students from Penn — even the ones that had no previous taking to a corporate lifestyle — giving into the notorious 100-hour work weeks?

Why does Penn foster an environment with a disproportionate amount of sup port for entering financial service fields? Why isn’t there more postgraduate support for public service and other non professional fields?

Penn’s culture of elitism is no matter of secrecy. Seventy-one percent of students come from the top 20%, 19% of students come from the top 1%, and only around 3% of Penn students come from the bottom 20%. This lack of socioeconomic diversity has led to the infiltration of the thought that the acquisition of social cap ital and social status is a matter of utmost importance in life. As a result, insecure, confused, and vulnerable students are easily targeted and picked up by financial juggernauts such as McKinsey, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley, etc.

These temptations of the so-called pursuit of selling out and working for a prestigious firm on Wall Street are also continuously pushed onto Penn students.

Clubs, recruiters, career fairs, and peers passionately speak of the perks of these renowned firms such as generous pay, the ease of getting involved in the field, short-term commitment, etc. With only a four-year degree, summer internships leading to job offers, and a path already walked by others, the support to enter a business or financial field is unmatched.

Evidently, a majority of students blindly hop on the bandwagon up to New York forgetting the highly questionable social and ethical impact of these firms that gets lost in the long list of material promises.

The culture of Wall Street is fully focused on itself — in which one guy is trying to make more money than the next. At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, recession, student debt, hous ing and health care costs, the system remains to be shaped in a way that benefits only go to people at the top. Firms continue to work with fossil fuel

companies, cigarette makers, opioid distributors, regulatory agencies, and autocratic regimes. The culture of dis respect and degradation toward women still persists. The rates of depression, anxiety, and immune-system problems that come with climbing the corporate ladder are ever growing.

Why have we glamorized a system that creates and perpetuates inequality?

However, if you do take this path, your goal should be for betterment. These internal systemic problems will not be fixed by only external voices speaking on them. Change will only happen if the future of the workforce that enters knows of the flaws and fights them from within.

Attending an institution where suc cess-driven students witness their peers become monetarily successful in their careers years before them leads to the feeling of being behind. Penn needs to support their students with more than just words. Actions such as investing in the creation of a school for public ser vice would send a signal to its student body that these fields are also valued. Increasing the number of events targeted toward taking the public service path, either with alumni or prominent figures in different fields, would help students get a sense of security in the path they take post-grad.

It’s time to re-evaluate the glorified wealth addiction and celebration of big business. Maybe I have an ignorant and idealistic understanding of the world — yes, time and money are valuable, and it is unrealistic to think that pursuing passion projects is a feasible path for ev eryone. And yes, the world isn’t shaped in a way that we can take multiple years to find out what our passions are before committing to them. But stop blindly walking the easy paved path others have taken. As Robert Frost once said, “I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference.”

LIALA SOFI is a College sophomore from Roanoke, Va. Her email address is lsofi@sas.upenn.edu.

SUVIR KAUL is the A. M. Rosenthal Professor of English and the past pres ident of the American Association of University Professors chapter at Penn. His email is

PHOTO BY JESSE ZHANG DESIGN BY ERIN MA

Philadelphia sports’ pride must carry over to Penn

W hat a time to be a Philadelphia sports fan.

With multiple teams recently experienc ing a wave of success, this season is certainly one for the history books. Not only did the Phillies qualify for the World Series for the first time in 13 years, the Philadelphia Union also made the Major League Soccer Championships, the Phila delphia Flyers are having a strong start to the season, and the Eagles are currently leading its division.

And true to its name, the City of Brotherly Love has come together to demonstrate over whelming support for their beloved athletes. An abundance of heartwarming videos has cir culated social media, depicting Phildelphians experiencing pure joy as they raise their fists after each victory, crowding together with cheers, embraces, and tears of delight.

“At the end of the day, I really feel being a sports fan connects you to the people and city around you and gives you something to believe in,” said Wharton junior Leigha Jackson. “Grow ing up outside of Philadelphia, my community would feel the highs and lows of Philly sports together. I remember so vividly how much the energy of the city changed when the Eagles won the Super Bowl, and it made years of support de spite loss after loss worth it.”

Even for those who are not up-to-date with the most recent scores, it is difficult to escape the contagious elation seeping throughout the city. Maybe you’ve witnessed a plethora of fans decked out in team merch dancing on the streets in celebration. Maybe you’ve heard the unofficial Phillies anthem, “Dancing on My Own,” one too many times. Or maybe you’ve noticed a decrease in city crime that is suspected to correlate with these athletic victories.

Regardless of your individual experience, there is no doubt about the power of sports in terms of uniting citizens and stimulating joy, making this a positive bonding experience we should all participate in.

“I would be lying if I said I understood what every penalty or technicality means, but I don’t think that you need to completely and totally understand a sport to be a fan,” Jackson added. “Getting to support your city and have something to look forward to and believe in is such a power ful feeling, and I really think that sports have the ability to unite people like nothing else.”

Nowadays, it is difficult to find things to cel ebrate given the significant social and political

polarization omnipresent in America. Especially as citizens await Election Day results, there is a palpable degree of political tension. Any elec tion naturally produces division and debate, but Pennsylvania’s status as a swing state serves to heighten this. It is more important than ever to learn about candidates and vote in elections, but we cannot let ourselves succumb to a world

of separation. It is therefore beneficial that this contentious time coincides with the surplus of Philadelphia pride, as sports are a neutral ground that warrants nothing but support and celebra tion.

However, these high spirits should not be ex clusive to Philly teams. It is important to extend this sense of camaraderie back to Penn, where an

increased level of school pride would bring stu dents together and boost athletes’ morale.

Support for our student-athletes is critical in terms of building a sense of community and rec ognizing their hard work and dedication. Sports are a huge part of college life, but Penn often lacks in terms of game day attendance and school spirit.

Wharton sophomore Davis Ellis is playing in his second season on the University’s foot ball team and said, “Knowing we have support from our classmates, teachers, and the rest of the Penn community is a huge confidence booster. We dedicate a lot of time to our sport and having people there to watch on game day makes the atmosphere that much more exciting to compete in.”

It is important for the Penn community to show our support. Even though Penn football has a strong team culture, their success also hinges upon their audience. Cheering on the football team or any of Penn’s 31 varsity sports benefits both the spectator and the athlete. Whether you compete in another sport or possess zero athletic knowledge, supporting our teams contributes significantly to the Penn community, while si multaneously providing athletes the confidence they need to succeed.

We therefore urge you to grab your friends, parents, or yourself and go support our teams. Men’s basketball takes on Drexel on Tuesday and West Virginia on Friday, and women’s basketball plays Saint Joseph’s on Tuesday and Villanova on Thursday. This Saturday, fencing competes at home, while many other sports including foot ball, swim, squash, and women’s cross country travel off-campus. Be sure to tune in live and send virtual support, or even better, take advan tage of the in-state locations with a quick road trip! Check out the athletic calendar for a full list of the teams competing every week.

EMILY CHANG is a College junior studying communication from Holmdel, N.J. Her email address is changem@sas.upenn.edu.

ANNIE BINGLE is a College first year student from Connecticut. Her email is bingle@sas. upenn.edu.

two courses heavily focused on examin ing the environment through a humanities lens.

According to Richter, Penn administration has been talking about introducing a climate educa tion requirement at the university for a good four years now, but it is not yet concrete. “I found that all along the way … almost everybody I asked in the administration, it doesn’t matter [at] what level, it almost feels like they were waiting to be nudged,” Richter recounted. “Like they knew that they could and should be doing this, but the opportunity hadn’t seemed to present itself.”

The best time for students to call on Penn to incorporate discussions of climate change, sus tainability, and the energy transition into the undergraduate curriculum was decades ago. The second best time is right now. Much like we cannot delay action on mankind’s greatest challenge of the 21st century, we cannot delay an educational requirement on the many, many ways we can combat it.

Despite the myriad ways we can address the climate crisis, there is a prevailing notion that jobs and coursework focused on it need to have “Climate” or “Sustainability” in their name. I applaud efforts by Columbia and Stanford to start separate schools dedicated to a better, netzero carbon future, but these feel like glorified versions of existing departments of earth and en vironmental science. They add publicity to the climate crisis, but they are not the best these uni versities can be doing. Do we want PR moves, or deliberate, thoughtful action?

At present, Penn is taking a closer look at climate, though you’d be forgiven for not notic ing. The University has hired Michael Mann, a leading climate scientist and skilled communi cator between the policy and technical arms of climate, as well as one of the originators of the Hockey Stick climate diagram. He is also the director of Penn’s new Center for the Science, Sustainability, & the Media, jointly run by the College and the Annenberg School for Com munication. Penn also runs the Environmental Innovations Initiative, which aims to develop interdisciplinary solutions to critical environ mental challenges we face today.

But interdisciplinary solutions to climate change cannot be encouraged in academia without students being aware of how their unique interests can intersect with the climate emergency.

Identifying this intersection is easier said than done. If we are to implement a requirement to take a course centered around climate change, we cannot limit the development of such courses to the Department of Earth and Environmental

Science. The good news is that at Penn, there are already many academic offerings that connect to climate from external departments.

In my own experience, two years and 30-some thing CUs into Penn, conversations around the climate emergency have popped up in unexpected places. Additional reading for “Accounting and Financial Reporting” touched on regulation from the Securities and Exchange Commission that re quires companies to disclose carbon emissions and climate risks. Lectures for “Introduction to Human Evolution” covered how humans have adapted in the past to changes in climate, and how they may adapt in the future. These readings and lectures could be extended into courses of their own with ambition and dedication.

In Wharton, you can take BEPP 2630, an energy and environmental economics course, or LGST 299, a climate action and leader ship course. There are engineering and science courses focused on specific climate solutions

across a myriad of disciplines: Just look at VI PER’s energy course requirement. There’s also a minor at Penn specifically dedicated to environ mental humanities, with a wide array of courses you can take.

All of these offerings are admirable, but they will only have a fraction of their potential impact if they are limited to self-selecting students that are already studying the climate in depth.

The climate crisis is not self-selecting — it can and will affect all of us. Granted, many of Penn’s students are in the upper echelons of society and have the means to avoid its worst effects, espe cially compared to impoverished communities worldwide that already face devastating flood ing, wildfires, and heat waves today. But these effects will nonetheless reverberate globally — dealing economic damage, as well as political violence and social unrest. No one is truly spared from climate change, and so all of us have both a moral and practical obligation to learn about it

and act on it, however we are best suited to do so.

I don’t mean to be all doom and gloom. In fact, a major justification for a far-reaching, all-en compassing climate education is to avoid climate fatalism, and to empower students to leverage what they are most passionate about as a means for taking action. The desire for this climate ed ucation is clearly there: Qe are just lacking in momentum. To any faculty or students who want to generate this momentum, I strongly urge you to speak to Penn’s administration about a robust climate education across all of Penn’s schools and programs. The time to act is now.

CAROLINE MAGDOLEN is a College and Engineering junior studying environmental science and systems engineering from New York City. Her email address is magdolen@sas. upenn.edu.

P rofessor Simon Richter is the Class of 1942 Endowed Term Professor of German — he is also one of the most vocal faculty members on climate change that I have ever met. Richter is a key founder of Climate Week at Penn and its signature 1.5* Minute Climate Lectures as well as an instructor for “Water Worlds” and “Forest Worlds,”

PHOTO BY ALAN ZHANG

PHOTO BY JESSE ZHANG

Spanish,” said Greta Kazenski, a senior global pro grams manager at Penn Abroad.

Students have yet to travel through this partner ship, except for two students who petitioned to study independently at the university, according to Kazenski — who added that she hopes to get some applicants for the fall semester. She added that the CASA-Santiago program in Chile was introduced right before the pan demic for College credit, and the first student will be traveling this spring.

“Chile just lifted a ton of COVID restrictions. There are no negative tests or masks required anymore,” said Kazenski, who had the opportunity to visit the pro gram this October.

Kazenski recommended the program for “out doorsy, adventurous students.”

“The location is the best of both worlds, surrounded by white-capped mountains and only an hour away from the beach,” she said.

Four of the programs were approved exclusively for Wharton credit. The Paris School of Business and Stockholm School of Economics programs were added to Penn Abroad during the pandemic, but no students have attended yet.

“There was a demand to be more centrally located in Paris,” said Erin Feeney, who is a global programs manager at Penn Abroad. Feeney recommended both programs to students who are taking a language course or have an interest in the local culture.

The CET São Paulo program in Brazil was added in October 2019. Students can direct-enroll in classes at Fundação Getúlio Vargas, which is one of the “best business schools in the world,” according to Kazenski.

“FGV is in a bustling part of the city, so you’re right there in the middle of everything,” she said.

The CIEE Cape Town program — which has been offered for over a decade — was approved in 2021 for Wharton credit, according to Michael Griego, a senior global programs manager.

“It’s the only program on the African continent ap proved for Wharton credit, so that provides a great global perspective,” Griego said.

According to Griego, the CIEE Cape Town program stands out because it is an English-speaking program at the No. 1 university in Africa, and it is in a metro politan global city.

“The program used to be very popular among Col lege students, and we haven’t had any students pursue Wharton credit yet,” he said.

The University of Queensland Nursing pro gram, which was previously offered in the spring and only to juniors, has been moved to the fall and

approved for both third- and fourth-year Nursing students.

“Students will do their community health place ment, which is a clinical rotation they would normally do in Philadelphia, but with the lens of the Australian health care system,” said Kazenski.

Participants will take a class focused on Aboriginal people, which will allow them to apply their clinical practice to a native population, she said.

Kazenski recommended that students interested in studying abroad come in with an open mind and “go with the flow.”

“In general, for a semester abroad, students have to be independent and a little bit adventurous,” said Ka zenski.

Feeney added that stepping away from Penn helps students gain soft skills and cultural experiences.

“If you want to spend a semester abroad, do it. You’re not going to regret it,” Griego said.

PHOTO BY VANESSA HUANG

Biotech Commons renamed following $5 million donation from Wharton alum

1997 Wharton graduate Wendy Holman donated the multimillion dollar gift to Penn to rename the library and fund its upkeep

KOMAL PATEL Senior Reporter

The recently renovated Biotech Commons will be renamed Holman Biotech Commons after a $5 mil lion gift from a Wharton alumna.

1997 Wharton graduate Wendy Commins Holman, her husband Wayne Holman, and their family do nated the multimillion dollar gift to Penn, which will rename the library and fund its upkeep.

Biotech Commons was previously called the Bio medical Library, but following the $11.5 million renovation completed in fall 2021, it was rebranded to reflect the library’s evolution and new aims.

“[Biotech] helps draw attention to the fact that we're trying to be more of an interdisciplinary hub across campus. [Commons] draws attention to the collaborative focus of the new facility,” Barbara Cavanaugh, an associate University librarian for Research Services & the director of Science and Business Libraries, previously told The Daily Penn sylvanian.

The Holmans supported the renovation at the time by funding the Wendy and Wayne Holman Read ing Room in the space. The room “serves as both

an independent study area and a multipurpose event space,” according to Penn Libraries.

Wendy Holman is the CEO and co-founder of Ridgeback Biotherapeutics, a biotechnology company focused on “developing transformational therapies to resolve or mitigate the effects of emerging infectious diseases,” according to its website.

She is also a member of the Penn Libraries Board of Ad visors, the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS, and the Board of Trustees of Sabin Vaccine Institute.

“Most of my work focus — as a philanthropist, vol unteer, and as a CEO — has a common thread: to have a tangible positive effect on health and human suffer ing,” Holman told Penn Libraries.

“Penn’s researchers, scientists, and scholars have done an incredible job leading the world in biomedical research, and our planet is a safer, better, and healthier place as a result,” Holman added. “Penn’s libraries are not only a place to house our tremendous col lections; they are centers of research excellence which continue to keep Penn at the forefront of innovation.”

“[Trump] incited an insurrection at our nation’s Capitol in an effort to overturn a free and fair elec tion,” Cassel-Siskind wrote. “Penn Dems may disagree with many of the policies that the Repub lican Party promotes, but Donald Trump takes it a step farther by actively attacking the democratic process and trying to take the choice of deciding America’s future away from the people.”

This announcement comes one week after the general midterm elections, in which Democrats maintained their majority in the U.S. Senate while Republicans are positioned to take back control of the U.S. House of Representatives.

Trump reflected on the results of the election in his speech, expressing his pride in seeing Repub lican victories.

While Kevin Kiley is projected to win his elec tion in California’s 3rd District, other candidates who Trump endorsed did not fair as favorably. Re ports indicate that politicians who echoed Trump’s lies about the 2020 presidential election being stolen were more likely to lose a competitive race.

In Pennsylvania, Democrat Lt. Gov. John Fetterman flipped the seat of Sen. Pat Toomey (RPa.), who did not run for re-election, in a decisive electoral victory over Republican Mehmet Oz — a Trump-backed candidate.

Trump also spoke about how he believes that the media will silence his campaign and his

supporters’ beliefs.

“The Washington establishment wasnts to si lence us, but we will not let them do that,” Trump said. “What we have built together over the past six years is the greatest movement in history be cause it is not about politics, it is about our love for this great country.”

Some Republicans, like Toomey, have ex pressed their discontent for Trump’s influence on the party.

“The party needs to get past Donald Trump,” Toomey said in an interview with Fox News on Saturday.

After a pause for the midterm elections, the U.S. Department of Justice is fully resuming its two investigations regarding the former president. One regards Trump’s involvement in the insur rection on Jan. 6, 2021, and the second surrounds his retention of sensitive documents at his Mar-aLago residence.

On Aug. 8, FBI agents raided Trump’s estate and allegedly broke into his safe in a search for official presidential records from the White House. The unprecedented raid was reportedly greenlit by 1987 Penn Carey Law graduate Bruce Reinhart.

Trump had been hinting at potentially enter ing the 2024 presidential race for weeks on Truth Social, his social media platform.

Penn Mentor Meals program launches aiming to foster mentorship relationships

New Student Orientation & Academic Initiatives said the program is a rebrand of the Take Your Professor to Lunch initiative

CAMELLIA BÙI Contributing Reporter

The Penn Mentor Meals Program — a new ver sion of the Take Your Professor to Lunch program — launched this month, allowing students to invite their mentor to a free lunch served at the Lauder Dining Cafe.

Troy Majnerick, associate director of New Student Orientation & Academic Initiatives, said that the program is a rebrand of the Take Your Professor to Lunch program, with more “sophisticated” features, but the same goal: to foster mentorship relationships for all Penn members. The mentors include any cur rent or past professors, teaching assistants, advisors, resident advisors, PHINS, Peer Advisors, cohort leaders, or members of Penn’s professional staff.

The Take Your Professor to Lunch Program — which was halted by COVID-19 dining regulations — was a Student Committee on Undergraduate Education initiative that was later officially un dertaken by the Provost Office, NSOAI, and Business Services.

Andrea Naughton, who is the assistant director of NSOAI, said that Penn Mentor Meals aims to create a space for members of the Penn commu nity to foster deeper relationships with mentors or people they work with on a daily basis. This will allows mentors and students to engage in deeper conversations beyond the conventional spaces where they would typically interact, Naughton said.

As opposed to the Take Your Professor to Lunch program — where lunches and dinners were served at regular dining halls — students and mentors are catered to a more “elevated” ex perience in the Lauder Dining Cafe, with more refined menu options and restaurant-style dining space, according to Majnerick.

Students express safety concerns in local Wawa stores following recent store closures

Wawa announced that it will shut down two of its stores in Center City due to security issues

SNEHA PARTHASARATHY Staff Reporter

After two Wawa convenience stores in Phila delphia have closed within the past month due to security issues, some Penn students say they are con cerned about safety in Philadelphia retail spaces.

In October, Wawa announced that it will shut down two of its stores in Center City — one on 12th and Market streets and the other on 19th and Market streets — citing safety concerns. University City Wawa employees were pepper sprayed and about 100 juveniles vandalized a Wawa store in Northeast Phil adelphia last month. In light of these incidents, some Penn students reported feeling less safe at retail lo cations, citing instances of crime and an increase in campus public safety alerts.

Wawa’s corporate headquarters did not respond to a request for comment. Vice President of the Divi sion of Public Safety Kathleen Shields Anderson told The Daily Pennsylvanian that DPS has proactively reached out to Wawa regarding these recent events, and that the company has plans to ensure “extra se curities” in all three locations in the University City area.

“[Wawa has] been in University City for a long time, and by working with them, I know they have a priority to maintain the safety of their customers and staff,” Shields Anderson said.

DPS sent out a safety advisory email on Oct. 19,

BY SUKHMANI KAUR

informing the Penn community about a pattern of robberies between Market and Chestnut streets in University City. The Plaza Art store, located close to campus, now only accepts payment by card after it was robbed twice, according to 6ABC. Shields Anderson told the DP that Penn, Drexel University, and Philadelphia Police Department were working together to investigate the situation.

Some Penn students have personally experienced instances of crime or violence at Wawa and said that following those incidents, they felt less safe fre quenting retail stores, particularly after midnight.

“Last week, I was in Wawa around 3 a.m. when someone entered and began yelling at four under graduate students while brandishing a gun. The cops had to come,” Wharton junior Bryan Yan said.

Wharton sophomore Riya Khosla shared Yan’s sentiment, adding that UPennAlert notifications contributed to student worries. These alerts are emailed and texted to the University community about situations that involve “an immediate threat to the health or safety of students or employees occur ring on campus,” according DPS’s website.

Class Board 2025 President and College sopho more Will Krasnow said that while he has not had any negative experiences at Wawa himself, he is aware that “some students [feel unsafe] and defi nitely consider it an issue.”

UPennAlerts regarding robberies have risen in the past few years, with 12 UPennAlerts issued for robberies issued in both 2020 and 2021, and eight in 2019. In 2021, the number of UPennAlerts issued by DPS increased to 67 from the previous year’s 58. Shields Anderson previously told the DP that the in crease was not due to a conscious effort to send more alerts.

Since the start of the 2022-23 academic year, there have been 13 UPennAlerts, 11 of which were related to robberies, burglaries, or thefts.

Shields Anderson offered advice to students feel ing unsafe around campus. She said that students should utilize the free resources DPS provides, such as the walking escorts and Penn Transit.

“Take a walking escort, use Penn Transit, ride SEPTA. Make use of these free resources and do what makes you feel safe,” she said.

Pamela Lampitt, director of Business Services, said that Penn Dining wants to emulate the ex perience of the original Take Your Professor to Lunch at University Club program, which was hosted in the Inn at Penn.

“There is a designated area for the University Club, very collegial looking, rich in Ivy, all the historical aspects of it. Everyone has cloth nap kins. No one has to clear their own table. There was a sort of an allure,” Lampitt said.

The Lauder Dining Cafe — particularly its more intimate dining pavilion — became the

natural location to recreate that kind of atmo sphere, according to Lampitt.

Nicholas Anderson, an Engineering senior studying mechanical engineering, participated in the program three times and was a mentor during two of them. He spoke positively of the food and the dining space.

Anderson tried the Take Your Professor to Lunch program during his first year and said that he relates to students who feel intimidated when asking their professors or TAs out for a meal. He believes that the location of the college house with friends around allows students to be in their “most comfortable state.”

“As a freshman, it was very nerve-wracking at first. Obviously, throughout the conversa tion in the meal, you get more comfortable. This program takes away a lot of that initial fear,” An derson said.

The Wharton School currently has its own ver sion of the program, the Lunch & Learn program, which funds Wharton professors and students to dine in different places outside of campus. The Take Your Professor to Lunch program has also received complaints about the limit on group size, capped at four for student-initiated meals.

Anderson said that it was an overall positive experience that facilitates all forms of conversa tion, and he highly recommends the program.

“The freshman that I was mentoring last week was asking about course selection and prioritiza tion during freshman year. Then, at lunch with the sophomore today, this guy is interested in starting a club and wanted advice. They’re totally different conversations, but both fall under the umbrella of this program,” Anderson said.

Majnerick said that NSOAI is interested in broadening the scope of the program to create more mentorship opportunities on campus and help stu dents define their academic experience.

“We're just beginning to scratch the surface of what this program can be. And that's why the re branding, the renaming, of the Penn Mentor Meals Program, allows us to provide a program that ul timately benefits the Penn community, not just on an individual basis, but also on a larger scale,” Ma jnerick said.

PHOTO FROM PENN TODAY

The Wendy and Wayne Holman Reading Room in the newly renamed Holman Biotech Commons.

PHOTO

Two Wawa locations in Philadelphia have closed in the last month.

PHOTO BY CAMELLIA BÙI

The Penn Mentor Meals Program launched on Nov. 1, allowing students to invite their mentor to a free lunch served at the Lauder Dining Cafe.

Ahead of its match against Rutgers, a number of Penn players have stood out throughout the season and will look to lead the way again to night, chief among them senior forward Ben Stitz.

Tallying nine goals and seven assists during the regular season, Stitz has left his legacy on the Penn men’s soccer program in his final campaign as a Quaker — even though the final chapter in the story has yet to be written.

All of Stitz’s goals came during a seven-game scoring streak in the middle of the season that began before Ancient Eight play picked up. Since the streak ended, though, he’s recorded five assists — including one on the late game-win ning goal against Cornell. Crafty strikes from the senior forward ignited much of the Red and Blue’s success this season.

Also critical for the Quakers this season — and likely on Thursday night — include soph omores Gaffney and forward Stas Korzeniowski.

Following an early-season run of goal involve ment during Penn’s non-conference schedule, Gaffney has found himself in a groove form inside the box once again late this season. In the past three games, Gaffney has totaled two assists and his first goal of the season, while building more confidence in front of the goal against stronger opponents.

Korzeniowski, meanwhile, has been the Red and Blue’s biggest offensive weapon this season with 10 goals — the most on the team — and six assists, the second most on the team.

Steve Donahue added. “The moments aren’t too big. And I thought [to] call his number because it’s not a big deal to him. This is what he does and he’s very confident in his ability.”

The blow proved fatal for Drexel, as Penn fin ished ahead 64-59 en route to its first victory of the season.

Slajchert and fellow junior guard Jordan Dingle again were the offensive engines power ing the team, as they combined for 37 of Penn’s 64 points.

Such a concentrated offensive output also arose from the rotation Penn utilized, which, for the first time all season, consisted of less than 10 players.

Another key for the Quakers was their effort to contain Drexel junior forward Amari Williams, who earned Colonial Athletic Asso ciation Defensive Player of the Year last season and served as the focal point of the Dragons’ offensive scheme on Tuesday night.

For context: In Drexel’s first game against Old Dominion, the 6-foot-10 forward recorded seven attempts. In the first half alone against Penn, Williams recorded 10 field goal tries.

“You send a second defender, and his ability to find shooters is really good,” Donahue said.

“I didn’t think we could afford to do that. So we were going to try and make him shoot over us. I thought we did a decent job, [but] he’s just that good.”

Tasked with guarding him was the trio of sophomore forward/center Nick Spinoso, senior center Max Lorca-Lloyd, and senior forward Michael Moshkovitz, who were more or less able to hold their own, as Donahue indicated. The big man shot 8-14 from the field — below what he’s shot so far this season.

Moshkovitz in particular stirred problems for Williams, who Donahue credited for his elite defensive skill as well as his passing ability — on grand display at Drexel with a team-high five assists.

“[He’s] terrific, an elite defender,” he said. “I don’t think people realize how good a defender he is. But then he can score, and he’s a great passer. Our guys know, so if Mosh goes into the lane and [gets] overplayed, they know how good a passer he is.”

Still, with Williams as the Dragons’ main of fensive thrust, the junior forward amassed 13 of their 22 points by halftime and finished the game with 20. It wasn’t enough, though, as Penn emerged with a win for the first time this season in four tries.

SUDOKUPUZZLE

A season highlight for the sophomore forward came during the team’s 4-1 win over Colgate, when Korzeniowski recorded a hat trick, marking the program’s first such achievement since 2017. The performance earned him both the Ivy League

Player of the Week and the Philadelphia Soccer Six Player of the Week titles. Rutgers enters the match Thursday coming off a 3-1 Big Ten Tournament win over Indiana. Homefield advantage for Penn, coupled with the energy

from friends and family in the stands, will have to override the momentum of the Scarlet Knights. Rutgers’ head start in high-pressure games will be another kind of beast this Penn men’s soccer team must reckon with.

PHOTO BY SAMANTHA TURNER

Sophomore forward Stas Korzeniowski fights off Princeton players for control of the ball during the away game at Powers Field in Princeton, N.J. on Nov. 12.

PHOTO BY SAMANTHA TURNER

The men’s soccer team poses

shirts honoring

new title as Ivy League champions, following their win against Princeton at Powers Field in Princeton, N.J. on Nov. 12.

PHOTO BY ANNA VAZHAEPARAMBIL Junior guard Clark Slajchert puts up a shot against Drexel during the game at Daskalakis Athletic Center in Philadelphia on Nov. 15.

In its third consecutive road game to open up the season, Penn women’s basketball — looking to re bound from a loss against Northwestern — fell to St. Joe’s in a tough 57-50 contest.

The game, which was back and forth the whole way, came down to which team could finish off the opportunities presented. While the Quakers (1-2) shot just 35.1% from the field and 30.4% from beyond the arc, the Hawks were able to make 40.4% of their shots from the field and 36.8% of their three-point attempts.

“Ultimately, we’re going to have to make some shots, right?” Penn coach Mike McLaughlin said. “We had some open shots tonight that [we missed]. Hopefully, we start making them a little more. I think that will certainly get us where we should be.”

While Penn’s star senior guard Kayla Padilla struggled offensively, scoring a season-low six points, junior forward Jordan Obi had her best per formance of the season, leading the team with 17 points. Junior forward Floor Toonders also had one of her best games yet, recording nine points, seven rebounds, a block, and a steal.

A rough offensive start saw both teams go through spells of time with no points being scored. Toonders opened up the scoring after three minutes of a defen sive stalemate. Playing well defensively at first, the Quakers would grab the lead early. However, with four and a half minutes left to play in the first quar ter, Penn would have its last lead of the game. St. Joe’s responded with several three pointers to tie the game before eventually taking the lead early in the second quarter.

Heading into halftime only down two, it seemed as if Penn was poised to make a comeback. However, a 21-point performance from the Hawks in the third

Princeton 28, Penn 13 — Jonah Charlton,

Editor-in-Chief

With one game to go, it’s already safe to say this season has been a major success. Penn has already won seven games after winning only three a year ago, sophomore quarterback Aidan Sayin has taken major steps forward as the team’s signal-caller, and the Quaker defense has quickly become one of the best in the conference.

All of that being said, Penn is still far from the best team in the Ivy League, which showed in last week’s blowout loss against Harvard, as the Princeton Tigers appear to still hold that designation. Leading the Ivies in passing yards per game, passing efficiency, defensive yards per game, touchdowns allowed, as well as a litany of other critical metrics, Princeton needs to simply beat Penn this weekend to reclaim at least a share of that title.

Given Penn’s recent running game woes, its compli cated path to even a share of the Ivy title, and the fact that the Quakers are on the road against their biggest rival, I expect that Princeton’s dynamic passing attack and ballhawking defense to prove too much of a challenge and for Penn to fall in the season finale.

Princeton 31, Penn 17 – Caleb Crain, Sports Associate

Turn back the clock three weeks. Penn football is 6-0, coming off a Homecoming win against previously-un beaten Yale. The offense is clicking on all cylinders, and the defense is hunting opponent ball carriers like U-boats prowling the Atlantic.

But in the last three weeks, the Quakers have suffered a collapse that would make even Kliff Kingsbury proud. The defense sputtered in a close loss at lowly Brown, and last week, the entire team looked inept as Harvard came into Franklin Field and trounced Penn.

Penn still has a shot to clinch an Ivy title this weekend. But to do that, it has to beat a Princeton team that cruised to an 8-0 start before a narrow loss to Yale last week end. Penn’s defense gives up the fewest points in the Ivy League … by a full touchdown’s margin. The air attack, led by Colorado transfer Blake Stenstrom, is undeniably elite. But with any giant, there are flaws: Princeton simply cannot run the football, and despite forcing 15 intercep tions, opposing quarterbacks complete nearly 65% of their passes.

The Quakers have a chance this weekend. But they simply do not have the athletes to keep up with Princ eton. Unfortunately, this season will probably end with another loss, and be remembered as yet another disap pointment.

Penn 28, Princeton 23 — Esther Lim, Sports Editor

After accepting its first defeat of this season at the paws of Brown, Penn managed to steer its ship away from a downward slide; a departure from mirroring the bleak three-loss conclusion to the 2021 season. The weekend fol lowing, Penn dug its heels into Ithaca ground and survived in relevance with a 28-21 win against Cornell.

Defeat at Brown had snipped short a six-game unde feated streak which fueled a triumphant momentum

quarter quickly put a stop to any momentum the Red and Blue had accumulated.

Through a late push led by Obi and sophomore guard Stina Almqvist, Penn was able to turn the game into a one-possession battle with under a minute to play in the fourth quarter. Unfortunately for the Red and Blue, it was too little too late, as the lead that the Hawks had built up in the third quarter proved too large to overcome.

for weeks. The gravity of the stakes after their first loss weighed ever large on the Quakers as they headed to con front Cornell. Yet Penn returned to the field, albeit without much grandeur, and emerged with the win with an out-ofcharacter loss to disprove.

Penn now faces one final stage to play out its oppor tunities. By now the scripts should be solid, the actors ready, and understudies prepared to pounce at any chance to prove their own name and elevate Penn. The Quakers surfaced at the start of this season through waters of doubt and discount, and this week feels somewhat the same.

As Joey Slackman described after Penn’s win at Cornell, the Quakers are “in a week-by-week mindset and taking things one step at a time. Everybody’s tired. Everybody’s sore. Everybody’s mentally exhausted. But it’s about how we can get up for each week and attack each day.”

Penn 23, Princeton 21 — Eashwar Kantemneni, Deputy Sports Editor

On paper, Princeton should be able to easily handle Penn. On paper, the Tigers have a higher-ranked offense and defense. On paper, momentum also favors Princeton, with its only loss coming in a game against a good Yale game marred by questionable officiating, while Penn has been floundering the past three weeks, dropping winnable games to Brown and Harvard.

But nothing this season has gone according to plan for the Quakers. On paper, they should have finished in the bottom half of the Ivy League. But instead, they are 7-2, and have a legitimate chance to bring home a piece of the Ancient Eight crown this weekend, if things go according to plan. While I cannot speak for Harvard in “The Game,” I believe the Red and Blue will do everything in their power to win their first Ivy League title since 2016.

Like any giant, Princeton has their flaws. Despite having a top-three offense in the conference, the Tigers have the worst-ranked rushing attack, and though they have the top-ranked defense, they still allow their oppos ing signal-callers to complete 64.7% of their passes, which is the second-worst in the league.

If Penn can capitalize on these flaws, by selling out more on the run and confusing Tigers quarterback Stenstrom in the pocket, taking and making safe and substantial throws on offense, and controlling the game clock to keep the ball away from Princeton’s explosive offense, it has a shot to pull off the upset. I believe that coach Ray Priore will have his players motivated and team ready to play from last week’s embarrassing home defeat on Family Weekend and the Quakers will out-tough the Tigers to a nailbiting victory.

Also, while Penn is a 14.5-point underdog in this game, don’t forget that the last time the Quakers were an under dog of close to that margin, they went to Hanover, N.H. and beat Dartmouth this season.

DPOSTM Season Records

Walker Carnathan: 5-2

Brandon Pride: 3-2

Eashwar Kantemneni: 3-1

Matthew Frank: 3-0

Kristel Rambaud: 1-2

Sean McKeown: 1-1

Jonah Charlton (NARP): 1-0

Joey Piatt: 1-0

Caleb Crain: 0-1

Justin Schwartz: 0-1

Riding off of St. Joe’s sophomore forward Talya Brugler’s game-high 23 points, the Hawks were able to close out the game, wining its third straight.

Despite the loss, Penn’s ability to push through a 14-point deficit to give itself a chance shows resil ience that could be useful down the line, according to McLaughlin.

“As a group, the team responded really well,” he said. “I think what we did today will translate for

PRINCETON

, from page 12

conversion rate of 69%. Iosivas is seasoned at defusing long bombs and leads the Ancient Eight with 912 receiving yards on the season and 7.1 receptions per game.

Priore emphasizes the need for the Quakers to have a strong pass rush against the Tigers in stopping the duo. Leading the conference with 31 sacks on the season, the Red and Blue hope to utilize their commanding strategy of denying quarterbacks on plays before the ball is thrown.

Despite the Garden State’s reputation for hos pitality, Princeton will not be welcoming back senior defensive linemen Jake Heimlicher and Grant Ristoff from injured reserve with open arms. Heimlicher is the first back-to-back Ivy League Defensive Player of the Week in Penn history and has become a name to watch by

growth for this team. We were a little bit more physi cal than we were [before]. I thought we defended harder than [before]. There’s so much there that we can grow from.”

The Red and Blue will face off against No. 24 Vil lanova next in their home opener on Thursday, Nov. 17 at 7:00 p.m., where they look to turn their season around in a statement game against their toughest opponent yet.

opposing quarterbacks with the most sacks in the conference.

Regardless of what happens this weekend, the Quakers’ season will be remembered as one that turned around a fledgling program into an Ivy League heavyweight. Very few fans expected the Red and Blue to jumpstart to a 6-0 record after finishing 3-7 last season and winning just one conference game.

“This is not a week of preparation; it has been nine months of preparation to get to this point in time,” Priore said. “Our players have worked hard. We really want it.”

With so much on the line this Saturday in a showdown between two teams who often mirror each other’s strengths and successes, Priore ex pects that the game can very well come down to the last moment as it did against Dartmouth and Yale.

Penn will take on Princeton this Saturday at 1:00 p.m. on Powers Field in Princeton, N.J. Fans can stream the game live on ESPN+.

The Hawks flew off with their third straight win, while the Quakers fell to their second loss of the season

VIVIAN

PHOTO BY BENJAMIN MCAVOY-BICKFORD

Junior guard Michaela Stanfield looks to drive to the basket during the preseason Red and Blue Scrimmage at the Palestra on Oct. 29.

PHOTO BY BENJAMIN MCAVOY-BICKFORD

Senior running back Trey Flowers avoids being tackled by a Harvard linebacker as he runs the ball down the field during the game at Franklin Field on Nov. 12.

With Ivy title on the line, football set to close season at Princeton

The Quakers’ Ivy title hopes hang by a thread after last week’s loss vs. Harvard

JUSTIN SCHWARTZ Sports Reporter

In its final bout of the season, Penn foot ball (7-2, 4-2 Ivy) heads to Princeton (8-1, 5-1) this Saturday with the goal of showing that the Quakers can overcome the odds one more time.

After losses in two of their last three games against Ancient Eight rivals Brown (3-6, 1-5) and Harvard (6-3, 4-2), the Quakers find them selves in a tough situation where they must beat Princeton and count on Harvard defeating Yale (7-2, 5-1) to clinch a four-way Ivy League cham pionship. This would be the first-ever four-way tie for the top spot in the conference’s 66 sea sons of play.

Standing in the way of the Red and Blue is a formidable Tiger defense that has held challeng ers to just 223.9 passing yards and 100.2 rushing yards per game. At its helm is junior linebacker Liam Johnson, whose agility and explosiveness led to an 89-yard interception return for a touch down against Cornell.

Similar to the Quakers, the Tigers’ wins can be attributed to holding opponents to meager scores of 12.78 points per game, transforming average offensive showings into blowout victo ries.

Looking back on Penn’s 14-point offensive showing against Harvard, sophomore quarter back Aidan Sayin hopes to see his squad not have a repeat performance against Princeton’s stout defensive unit.

“The overall execution must be better,” he said. “We as a unit have much more to give on the offensive front, so we should be better.”

The million-dollar question is whether the Tigers will face the Quaker offense that bull dozed over Georgetown and Columbia and withstood close matchups against Dartmouth and Yale, or the unit that failed to generate any momentum against Harvard.

“Our offense has to play against one of the best defenses in the league every day in prac tice,” coach Ray Priore said. “We will find weaknesses in [Princeton’s] structure and attack those weaknesses.”

Priore understands that a strong defense fronts no new challenge for the Quakers and is confident in his offensive line’s ability to make monumental plays in deciding moments. Tideturning plays haven’t been a scarce commodity for the Quakers, between senior running back Jonathan Mulatu’s huge 58-yard touchdown at Brown and Sayin’s 47-yard deep ball to junior wide receiver Sterling Stokes for a touchdown at Cornell.

On the other end of the field, the Red and Blue’s top-tier defense will face its biggest test of the season against one of the conference’s most dominant duos: junior quarterback Blake Stenstrom and senior wide receiver Andrei Io sivas. Stenstrom leads Ivy League quarterbacks in several categories, including 2,490 passing yards on the season and a highly reliable pass

So You’re Sayin Chance? There’s A

Football at Princeton: The picks are in

season, the Red and Blue marched into Dartmouth and took a statement win, so anything’s possible.

Five Daily Pennsylvanian staffers make their predic tions ahead of Saturday’s season-ending contest.

Penn enters its final game of the season as 14.5-point underdogs. Based on that spread, it’d be hard to have a ton of faith in the Quakers against Princeton. But the only other time they were double-digit underdogs this

Princeton 24, Penn 14 — Brandon Pride, former Senior Sports Editor Despite what our algebra teachers may have taught us, the transitive property actually does not exist … at least not in Ivy League football. Princeton, a dominant team, lost to Yale, a good team that lost to Penn but beat Brown, a team that topped Penn, by 52 points — you get the picture. That’s why it’s almost

fitting that the conference could end up in a four-way tie; however, I don’t expect Penn to get the job done on Saturday.

The Tigers’ offense will no doubt be hard for the Quakers to contain, but even if the typically stout Red and Blue defensive front performs well, the question will be if the offense can still keep pace. Princeton is only allowing 12 points per game on the season, and, despite its improvements, Penn will likely still have a tough time moving the ball consistently at Princeton Stadium.

Dragon slayers: Penn prevails at Drexel

MATTHEW FRANK Sports Editor

It took four tries, but at long last, Penn men’s basketball lists itself in the winners’ column.

On Tuesday night, the Quakers (1-3) traveled to Drexel (1-1) — a road trip that took them as far as the Market Street Wawa — seeking their first win of the season following losses to Iona, Missouri, and Towson. After getting out to a lead as big as 13 in the first half, the Dragons clawed back to as close as two in the second.

That tight margin came with 1:34 left to play, as the packed Drexel crowd was going wild and all momentum seemed to be in the Dragons’ favor. But in the first play out of the timeout, junior guard Clark Slajchert stepped up just behind the three-point line and drilled a triple from the top of the key to put Penn up five, si lencing the Drexel faithful.

“They’d been going under their ball screens all game, so I knew I was going to have it,” Slajchert said. “They were giving it to me, so I knew when it came down to it, I could just kind of calm down, step behind the three, and knock down the shot.”

“He’s just a stone-cold killer,” Penn coach

PHOTO BY ANNA VAZHAEPARAMBIL

On the shortest road trip in Division I basketball, the Quakers returned with its first win of the season

PHOTO BY ANNA VAZHAEPARAMBIL

Senior center Max Lorca-Lloyd dunks against Drexel during the game at Daskalakis Athletic Center in Philadelphia on Nov. 15.

Can the Quakers keep their Ivy title hopes alive? Here’s what our panel of five experts thinks

JONAH CHARLTON, CALEB CRAIN, EASHWAR KANTEMNENI, ESTHER LIM, & BRANDON PRIDE Sports Staff

Sophomore quarterback Aidan Sayin looks to close out his season with a win on the road at Princeton.