September 16, 2021

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021 VOL. CXXXVII NO. 19

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Students largely dissatisfied with Penn’s new block schedule Some students said the new schedule, created to add more travel time between classes, has led to inefficient break periods, more course conflicts, and a packed Locust Walk STEPHANIE CHEN Staff Reporter

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Penn’s new block scheduling system has introduced some challenges for students this year, creating inefficient break periods, preventing them from register9:00 ing for certain classes, and raising social distancing concerns.

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The fall 2021 semester marks the beginning of the University’s new block schedule format, which created standardized class start times and eliminated the possibility of back-to-back classes.

University administrators told The Daily Pennsylvanian in February that the new schedule aims to ease the course selection process by reducing course conflicts and encourage wellness on campus by providing breaks between classes. Just weeks into the semester, however, students are voicing concerns about the convenience and safety of the new schedule.

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Jocelyn Chin, a junior in the Engineering School studying chemical and biomolecular engineering, said her engineering classes conflict with classes she needs for her planned minor in sustainability and environmental management offered by the College of Arts and Sciences and the Wharton School. With the new block schedule, she may be unable to complete the minor, Chin said.

“I might not be able to fulfill my minor now that all the classes are kind of happening at the same time blocks,” Chin said. “I definitely think there’s a lot less flexibility, and I think they make it especially hard for engineers to do anything outside of engineering.”

Under the new format, classes start at one of eight designated start times beginning at 8:30 a.m. and ending at 8:30 p.m., with the latest classes ending at 10 p.m. Classes will run for either 60, 90, or 180 minutes, and students will have at least 15 minutes between classes.

Challenges in fulfilling degree requirements The block schedule has made it difficult for some students, particularly 7:00 dual-degree students, to schedule courses across different schools at Penn.

The recommendations come weeks after a tense meeting between faculty and University administration SUMMER WYLIE Staff Reporter

Penn’s chapter of the American Association of University Professors sent a list of faculty expectations for COVID-19 work safety guidelines to the University — the latest installment in a series of tense exchanges between faculty members and administrators regarding virus safety in the classroom.

The statement, sent to administrators on Sept. 11, outlines three main recommendations for Penn: to include classrooms in contact tracing procedures and notify instructors, staff, and students of a positive case in the classroom; to announce clear masking guidelines and provide free, high-quality masks to everyone required to work and study on campus; and to allow instructors to choose whether to teach in person or virtually.

AAUP-Penn is a membership-based national professional organization created by Penn faculty members earlier this spring that seeks to advance shared university governance and academic freedom, define professional values and standards, and

Yoon had planned out her junior year course calendar during her first year at Penn and planned to take her chemistry and MSE major courses this semester.

The new block schedule, however, led to time conflicts for all her MSE major requirements, forcing Yoon to instead enroll in several general education courses this fall. Now, Yoon said she has to take four to five MSE courses in the fall of her senior year, while she works on graduate school applications.

“I was planning all my electives in my senior year so that I can be more chill, and so that I don’t stress out about school stuff,” Yoon said. “It’s a huge change in my plans because of the conflicts.”

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College senior Alexandria Raday noticed that Locust Walk and many buildings on campus are more packed than before the new block schedule was implemented, raising concerns about a potential spread of the highly transmissible Delta variant on campus.

“It’s just so crowded now,” Raday said. “There are a lot of people, and with this Delta variant, things are spreading faster.”

promote economic security for university faculty members.

“There is broad consensus that Penn must institute the following measures if the University expects faculty and staff to work productively and well this semester under potentially life-threatening conditions,” the AAUP-Penn statement reads.

In an emailed response to AAUP-Penn leaders on Sept. 13, Vice Provost for Faculty Laura Perna maintained that “Penn operates with the expectation that our students receive – and reap the benefits of – an in-person pedagogical experience,” adding that the University is working closely with the Faculty Senate, the body that serves as the representative voice for full-time teaching faculty, to address issues of faculty safety.

Perna wrote that instructors may consult with their schools to temporarily switch to remote instruction if many students are absent from class. To date, Perna wrote that school deans have received “an extremely small number of r e q u e s t s for exemption from in-person

BRANDON LI

SEE AAUP PAGE 2

Students with disabilities face challenges in accessing campus buildings Some campus buildings and college houses don’t have accessible entrances or elevators KAMILLE HOUSTON SEJAL SANGANI Senior Reporter, Staff Reporter

Although Penn’s campus is compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act, students with disabilities are struggling to find accessible entrances, navigate buildings without elevators, and secure accessible on-campus housing.

Students with a range of documented disabilities receive University services, such as extended time on assessments, housing accommodations, and Penn Accessible Transit. Still, some students face many challenges to accessing sufficient accommodations, particularly regarding building accessibility.

The ADA provides protections for individuals with disabilities by requiring that workplaces, schools, and other public institutions offer reasonable accommodations to people with disabilities. Such

F “I’d really like to see more cleaning procedures in between classes like they said there was going to be,” Sheumaker said.

This is also the first year Penn is requiring that all sophomores, in addition to first years, live on campus as part of the Second-Year Experience. New College House West opened at the start of the semester and houses around 450 students.

Unproductive break periods Multiple students have expressed their frustration over the 45-minute break periods in between classes, with some describing them as unnecessary and inefficient.

Because of the higher volume of students, Wharton and College junior Carson Sheumaker said he would like to see the professors sanitize their classrooms more frequently.

COVID-19 social distancing concerns The new standardized class times have created social distancing concerns for some who have noticed that Locust Walk is more crowded this year, as many students walk to their classes at similar times.

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AAUP-Penn sends administrators recommendations for classroom COVID-19 safety

Like Chin, Yein Yoon, a junior in the Vagelos Integrated Program in Energy Research studying chemistry and material science and engineering, said she struggled to register for her dual-degree requirements due to the new scheduling system. She added that further scheduling conflicts may prevent her from graduating on time and that an extra semester or year at Penn would be a significant financial burden to her as an international student from Korea without financial aid.

“I go from 8:30 to 5:00 but have these random 45-minute breaks, and I’d rather end early,” Chin said, adding that the breaks are not enough time to be productive, which forces her to stay up later at night in order to SEE SCHEDULE PAGE 2

services range from academic to mobility-related accommodations that are largely managed by Student Disabilities Services and Weingarten Learning Resource Center at Penn.

Eva Lew, director of architecture and planning in the Office of the University Architect, said there aren’t any current plans to renovate campus buildings for accessibility reasons, though the department always looks for opportunities to partner with schools and centers to improve their buildings. In an emailed statement to The Daily Pennsylvanian, Jesselson Director of Student Disabilities Services Aaron Spector also wrote that SDS works collaboratively with students to arrange accommodations on Penn’s campus.

“Physical accessibility can be a challenge on a campus as large, urban, and historic as Penn,” Spector wrote. “SDS encourages any student who has concerns about mobility to contact us.”

Struggling with accessibility in campus buildings College junior Kruti Desai is the cofounder of Disability Advocacy @ Penn, a student group dedicated to supporting and creating a space for individuals with disabilities at Penn. Founded in 2020, DAP works closely with SDS to provide accommodations for students and make sure the Penn community is aware of SDS resources.

Desai said that while many campus buildings have accessible entrances or elevators, they are difficult to find, especially when students are running low on time. Some accessible entrances also depend on the presence of a security guard to open the door from the inside, as these entrances are not open to the public.

Desai, who walks with a crutch, said she can use the stairs if necessary but

prefers to use an elevator. In multiple occurrences, Desai said she has been forced to use the stairs when she was unable to find the elevator or an individual was not available to open an accessible entrance.

“I’m very fortunate that I’m in a situation where I can go up stairs,” Desai said.

“But there are definitely [Penn students] who can’t.”

College sophomore Ellie McKeown, who has hypermobility spectrum disorder, walks with a cane or a walker because the collagen between her bones is either nonexistent or nonfuctioning. McKeown is a member of Bloomers, Penn’s comedy group for underrepresented gender identities, but said she struggles to visit the rehearsal space in the Platt Performing Arts House.

The accessible entrance to Platt Performing Arts House is six times more lengthy than the primary, inaccessible entrance, McKeown said. To get to the rehearsal space, students must enter Stouffer College House, ask the guard to use the elevator, and walk underground from the Stouffer basement to the Platt basement.

McKeown said that it’s likely that a lack of useful accommodations is preventing students from participating in performing arts.

“Has Penn never had a disabled performing arts student? Or has Penn just made sure no disabled student is in the performing arts?” she said.

McKeown also mentioned that many of the automatic door touchpads on campus do not work, which is problematic for individuals who use wheelchairs or don’t have the strength or ability to manually open a door. She expressed SEE ACCOMODATIONS PAGE 2

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finish her work.

College senior Alexandria Raday added that because there is not enough time to study efficiently during the breaks, she is not sure what to do during those 45-minute periods. Sheumaker similarly believes the breaks in between classes are unnecessary.

“Even going from Engineering to Huntsman Hall, if I had some pep in my step, I could get there on time [before AAUP FRONT PAGE

teaching, with no requests in several schools,” and that these requests have received guidance from the Provost’s Office.

AAUP-Penn President and English professor Suvir Kaul said that the faculty organization’s goal is to ensure that each faculty member is able to choose the instruction delivery method that best suits them and their personal circumstances without having to proceed through a complicated process with the University. AAUP-Penn is not advocating for a full return to virtual instruction, Kaul said, adding that he himself is eager to be back in the classroom.

Penn undergraduate professors are currently required to teach in person, though medical exemptions can be granted through receipt of a medical accommodation from the Office of Affirmative Action and Equal ACCOMODATIONS FRONT PAGE

frustration that even though the wheelchair symbol is the face of the disability rights movement, the University doesn’t have adequate wheelchair access.

“Penn is not even getting the baseline of the movement,” McKeown said. “How can we progress if we can’t even get in the buildings and get in the room to let our voices be heard?”

Graduate student and DAP co-founder Emma Ronzetti spoke to another aspect of building accessibility.

Ronzetti, who wears hearing aids, requires auditory accommodations for classes. Since many of Penn’s buildings are old and have low sound absorbency, there is a lot of echo, which causes hearing difficulties, Ronzetti said. She added that the microphone systems used in lecture halls are often not compatible with hearing aids.

“For me, it’s really understanding the effect that echo and [reverberation] has on your hearing,” she said. “Most Penn buildings are very old, and they might need to be updated for sound quality in ways that people don’t really recognize.”

SDS gave Ronzetti a portable FM system, which helps reduce background noise and improve clarity, that hooks up to her hearing aids during classes. Some classrooms in Huntsman Hall also have hanging microphones that connect directly with her hearing aids, which she said have been really helpful.

For mobility across campus, the University offers Penn Accessible Transit, which provides transportation for individuals with disabilities to various campus locations.

Desai said she frequently uses the transit system to

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the block schedule system],” he said. “It’s definitely easier to do now, but I think the cost is like an extra hour every day. And I personally don’t think it’s worth it.”

Chin said the previous system’s ability to schedule classes back-to-back was more efficient, as she would have the same number of classes each day but end by the early afternoon. Yoon and Raday both added that their days have become much “longer” due to the block schedule.

“It’s definitely given me stress in terms of planning stuff. Also, just because my day got longer, I feel like I

have less time to work on my own stuff,” Yoon said.

Since the new schedule allows for more time between classes, some professors are choosing to utilize the entire class period rather than ending 10 minutes earlier, as they would have in the old schedule. The schedule does not require professors to teach for this extra time, University administrators had previously clarified to the DP after several faculty members reported unclear communication.

Still, some students are optimistic about the new block schedule system.

Engineering sophomore Katherine Han, who has never experienced the old scheduling system in person, finds the new schedule to be organized.

“I feel like I’m more in sync with my friends, so that’s the benefit. And it makes the class times easier to remember,” Han said.

Raday added that she hopes to adjust to the block schedule going forward.

“I think they’re definitely going to be something to get used to, but I’m sure there’s more benefits than we think now, I hope so,” Raday said.

Opportunity Programs. Kaul said he worries about the potential complications this process may pose for faculty.

The AAUP-Penn recommendations come just weeks after more than 225 faculty members signed a petition, sent to administrators on Aug. 22, urging Penn to allow instructors to choose whether they want to deliver course instruction virtually or in person.

AAUP-Penn met with University administrators on Aug. 27 “to relay still unaddressed safety concerns” and to reiterate calls for faculty to be able to determine the instruction format of their classes.

Kaul said although attending administrators were respectful and attentive, the meeting failed to yield any concrete steps toward AAUP-Penn’s goals.

Shortly afterward, the Faculty Senate held a virtual seminar on Sept. 1 to address faculty attendees’ prewritten questions they posed about in-person learning.

Panelists at the seminar included Perna, Chief Wellness Officer Benoit Dubé, Vice President for Human

Resources Jack Heuer, and Vice President for Facilities and Real Estate Services Anne Papageorge.

As stated in her recent email to AAUP-Penn, Perna told attendees at the meeting that Penn is committed to inperson learning and that online instruction cannot replace an experience in the classroom.

The virtual seminar prompted discontent among faculty, some of whom anonymously left critical messages in the chat box. Many messages criticized the University’s lack of clear communication and highlighted the personal stress faculty members have felt throughout the pandemic.

“I have not received a single university communication that has even acknowledged how stressful this situation is for caregivers of vulnerable populations, including children who cannot be vaccinated. What is the University doing to support these families?” one attendee wrote.

“I don’t understand why the classroom is considered low-risk exposure. We spend 180 minutes per week per

class with these students in packed conditions, sometimes in very small rooms, with many people speaking, some in inadequate or improperly worn masks,” another attendee wrote.

Other messages questioned the expertise of the speakers, with one commenter asking whether there was a public health expert on the panel. AAUP-Penn leaders later accused administrators of evading questions in a statement released on Sept. , the day after the faculty seminar.

AAUP-Penn asserted in its Sept. 11 statement that the University is downplaying the risks of COVID-19 by forcing professors to teach in person.

“The key principle at issue here bears stating directly: while our levels of comfort with the risks may vary, it should not be assumed that anyone — not faculty, building maintenance staff, graduate student instructors, office staff, cafeteria workers, librarians, RAs, etc.— has agreed to risk their lives and the lives of loved ones in order to do

get to far-away locations such as the Chemistry Complex or David Rittenhouse Laboratories. Although she schedules her rides the night before, the transportation is usually late, with delays of around 20 minutes.

Desai said she can walk to classes, but it is challenging because she has to take outside routes, such as Spruce or Chestnut Streets, because Locust Walk has inaccessible features such as the bridge adjacent to Class of 1920 Commons.

“It’s definitely a flawed system,” Desai said of Penn Accessible Transit. She added that better organizing within the program is a necessary and helpful change.

McKeown also expressed a desire for more funding for the program.

Students say some College Houses aren’t accessible Desai and McKeown said Penn’s college houses are inaccessible, with several residential buildings lacking elevators or having limited elevator access, including Gregory, Du Bois, Stouffer, and the Quad.

Both students have worked with SDS to receive housing accommodations.

Desai lived in an accessible room on the ground floor of Gregory College House during her first year at Penn, since the building is not equipped with elevators. She said the laundry room in Van Pelt Manor, one of the two buildings that compose Gregory, was on the ground floor as well, which did not pose a problem for her.

The laundry room in the Class of 1925 section of Gregory, however, is in the basement, making it essentially impossible for students with disabilities living in the Class of 1925 building to do their laundry.

McKeown, who lived in the Quad last semester, said that she was originally placed in a room without elevator access, and even after she was reassigned,

the elevator only allowed her to access a “strip of hallway.”

“There are so many internal stairs in the Quad that I can’t walk around inside. I have to take the elevator to go outside, find the new building, find a new elevator, and then just hope it can access my friend’s room,” she said.

Desai added that because of the Quad’s inaccessibility, students with disabilities who want to live there may not be able to. Although she didn’t want to live in the Quad, she expressed frustration for others.

“I just don’t think the Quad is very accessible at all,” Desai said. “The Quad is such a quintessential freshman experience, so for someone who wanted to live there but then [ended] up having to miss out on it because of their disability, that would kind of suck.”

McKeown now lives on the third floor of Harnwell College House. McKeown said it took her months to finally receive a housing assignment that met all of their approved accommodations, which is a single room near the ground floor in a college house with elevator access close to a dining hall.

Students with disabilities push for further support Ronzetti, McKeown, and Desai all cited various changes they would like to see in order to increase accessibility at Penn.

McKeown called on the University to ensure the functionality of existing accommodations, including that automatic door touchpads work and that ramps do not have potholes or divots. McKeown hopes to see more disability-friendly entrances — preferably not in the back of buildings — or even primary entrances that are accessible themselves.

She also complimented the PennAccess tool, which generates maps demonstrating accessibility

features for each building, but noted that this is “only a start.”

“Penn culture is extremely ableist,” McKeown said. “I understand this is an old campus, but disabled people existed then, they exist now, and they will exist in the future.”

Facilities & Real Estate Services offers PennAccess, a series of documents that provides access information for campus buildings and public spaces for individuals with physical disabilities. Information includes designated accessible entrances, elevator and accessible restroom information, and routes where barriers exist.

The Accessibility Mapping Project also uses crowd-sourced data to create a map with accessibility information about campus buildings.

Ronzetti suggested that the University draw from the Universal Design concept, which requires designing an environment that can be accessed, understood, and used by all people regardless of age, size, and ability. This would include minimizing echo and increasing sound absorption in campus buildings, as well as adding microphone systems like those in Huntsman Hall to newer facilities, Ronzetti said.

This year, Disability Advocacy @ Penn has a seat on University Council, which they plan to use to raise issues of accessibility to the administration, Desai and Ronzetti said. The University Council is a deliberative forum comprised of 16 undergraduates, administrators, faculty, and graduate students. The body meets monthly to discuss Penn’s activities.

“There are some really good systems set in place,” Desai said. “There’s so many resources set in place. I think they’re just not being utilized properly.”

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‘Warming is human activity’: Penn experts urge climate action Penn experts, some of whom contributed to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, are emphasizing the urgency of climate action and reaching net-zero carbon emissions WILLIAM KUSTER Staff Reporter

Penn experts on climate action, some of whom contributed to the groundbreaking Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change published this summer, are emphasizing the urgency of climate action and reaching net-zero carbon emissions, particularly after the recent severe flooding and tornadoes that tore through Philadelphia.

The first of three installments of the IPCC’s sixth assessment report was released on Aug. 9, with the remaining two installments anticipated to release in 2022. Michael Weisberg, chair of the department of Philosophy and director of post-graduate programs at Perry World House, will be a contributing author to the report’s second installment. The IPCC was created by the United Nations in 1988 in efforts to form a global

Phila. DA Larry Krasner talks criminal justice reform, voter turnout at Penn Dems event Krasner said that grassroots movements for criminal justice reform have led to more elected progressive prosecutors SHEILA HODGES Staff Reporter

Penn Democrats hosted Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner on Monday for a discussion on the importance of increasing voter turnout and progressive criminal

NEWS 3

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021 scientific body responsible for providing comprehensive climate and mitigation reports, which are usually published every few years. The last physical report was published in 2013.

This year’s report drew from over 14,000 peerreviewed scientific studies on the physical science of climate change, which United Nations Secretary General António Guterres called a “code red for humanity.”

A key takeaway from the IPCC report is that human influence has unequivocally warmed Earth’s atmosphere, oceans, and land.

The report writes that temperatures have risen the most in the last half century in over 100,000 years, with the last five years being the hottest on record since 1850.

Anthropogenic activity has also accelerated sea level rise and sea-ice retreat according to the report, and has intensified heat waves. The report also voids any pathways of keeping global warming to the 1.5°C threshold scientists had once aimed for.

Weisberg said this year’s report “made the strongest statements ever about that the climate is changing, that humans are the cause of it.” He added that the report may be the “greatest expression” of international scientific collaboration.

“With kind of startling urgency for an IPCC document, they basically say it’s virtually impossible for us to avoid the 1.5°C threshold,” Mark Hughes, director of Penn’s Kleinman Center for Energy Policy, said. Already at 1.2°C above pre-industrial levels, Hughes predicted the Earth will cross 1.5°C within the next two decades, setting a new goal of remaining below 2°C. “The cause of that warming is human activity,” Hughes said.

Howard Kunreuther, ​​a professor in The Wharton School who also serves as co-director of Wharton’s Risk Management and Decision Processes Center, identified

three major takeaways from the report. First, he said humans are witnessing climate change and carbon emissions creating more serious problems than anyone had anticipated even one or two years ago. Second, he advised students, organizations, and countries to take advantage of the fact that we are now experiencing these events, in hopes of finally addressing biases and heuristics that prevent people from taking action against climate change.

Finally, Kunreuther emphasized that both the government and public-private partnerships must involve individuals, organizations, and countries in developing strategies to take action.

“We can’t wait another five or 10 years to get these measures in place. We have to do something now,” Kunreuther said. The United Nations’ annual Climate Change Conference this November, called COP 26, will be an important phase to implement the report’s recommendations, he said.

The revelations published in this year’s IPCC report are substantial compared to IPCC reports from previous years, professors said.

“In general, the IPCC is relatively conservative in its assessments, because it represents a kind of consensus viewpoint among the world’s scientists who work on relevant topics,” Brian Berkey, an assistant professor of legal studies and business ethics, said. Hughes echoed Berkey, adding that the IPCC has a “very high standard for saying something is true.”

Weisberg added that this year’s report includes more data and modeling than in previous reports, which has increased the precision of estimates made in the report.

The report includes sections published by three, separate working groups.

Weisberg, who contributed to the first chapter of this report’s second working group, works with Perry World

House and the United Nations to focus on the role that local communities play in climate change adaptation and preparation in their own regions. The second working group covers impacts, vulnerabilities, and adaptation, and is preparing to be released by February. Weisberg’s chapter specifically discusses climate decision-making and the “principles, ethics, and justice that go into it,” he said.

The third and final working group will address avenues for mitigation and greenhouse gas reductions, and will be released in March 2021. Kunreuther, who served as a coordinating lead author for the third working group for Assessment Report 5 published in 2014, wrote about climate change mitigation strategies, adaptation, and climate resiliency.

In addition to their own research, professors are hoping Penn follows through with its previously announced climate action plans. Weisberg said it would be a significant step if the University commits to its goal to reach net-zero emissions by 2042.

Last April, Penn announced its goal of achieving net-zero emissions by 2050. In 2019, Penn released its Climate and Sustainability Action Plan 3.0, setting goals to reach net-zero emissions on campus by 2042, and a 40% reduction in buildings emissions by 2030. The University’s latest goals align with those mentioned in the 2015 Paris Agreement and the IPCC’s Global Warming of 1.5°C. Professors are also optimistic about climate action on campus. The University’s Climate Week will begin on Sept. 20, during which students and faculty will be able to engage in activities such as panels, webinars, and lectures on topics related to climate justice and action.

“There’s a growing awareness among faculty and students that this is something that we really should take seriously. And that’s encouraging, too,” Berkey said.

justice reform.

More than 20 Penn and Philadelphia community members gathered outdoors at the intersection of Locust Walk and 40th Street to hear Krasner answer questions from the group regarding his work on criminal justice reform, his recent win in the Democratic primary in May, and the role of higher voter turnout in the primary election.

Krasner, the incumbent candidate who took office in January 2018, beat challenger Carlos Vega, who is the first Latino homicide prosecutor in Pennsylvania, after receiving 64.9% of the vote. In April, Penn Democrats and Penn Justice Democrats endorsed Krasner for reelection, citing Krasner’s commitment to criminal justice reform and his history of holding police officers accountable.

During the event, Krasner spoke about the high voter turnout in the May 18 primary election, during which each political party chooses its candidates to run for office during the general election. He credited the turnout rates to the relevancy of criminal justice reform in his campaign, and said there was a 21% turnout of eligible voters compared to the usual 9% to 12% turnout.

“When you put criminal justice reform on the ballot, people turn out who are unlikely voters,” Krasner said.

“They are either people who are alienated by politics, or they are people who are most significantly affected by our criminal justice system. They are also often young people.”

This increase in voter turnout is needed to put more

progressive district attorneys in office, Krasner said. He added that ever since the publication of “The New Jim Crow” by Michelle Alexander, a book on the history of mass incarceration in the United States, more district attorneys have been pushing for criminal justice reform.

“Two years ago, 10% of the United States had a progressive prosecutor,” Krasner said at the event. “George Floyd happened in the last two years and everything around that occurred. You now have 20.1% of the United States that has elected and reelected in many instances a progressive prosecutor.”

Grassroots social justice movements for reforming the criminal justice system are the cause of these increased elections, Krasner said. He predicted that more progressive district attorneys will take office as the effects of “The New Jim Crow” book and other social justice movements persist.

Krasner emphasized the need for more progressive Democratic officials as well.

As the upcoming race for Pennsylvania’s two U.S. Senate seats approaches, Krasner said it will be important for cities like Philadelphia and Pittsburgh to have high voter turnout.

“I hope the key takeaway [from today’s event] is that they register everybody. They get everybody who just turned the age of 18, and take them by the ear and show them how to vote, and they get everybody on the planet to vote in Pennsylvania,” Krasner told a Daily Pennsylvanian reporter at the event.

Penn students who attended the event said they appreciated the opportunity to hear Krasner speak and ask him questions.

“It was really cool to hear from an incredibly smart, progressive district attorney from Philadelphia who we’ve helped to elect in the spring, and we’re really excited to work with him,” Noah Lewine, Penn Dems political director and College sophomore, said.

For College first year and Penn Dems deputy board member Sophie Howery, it was shocking to receive the email from Penn Dems announcing Krasner would speak with students on campus.

“It was great getting a personal conversation with the district attorney, and getting answers to questions that you generally don’t really have access to,” Howery said.

College first year Jack Burgess said he learned a lot from the event, specifically about prosecution in Philadelphia and Krasner’s work to help end cash bail.

Similarly, Penn Dems political senior deputy and sophomore Lucy Kronenberg found the experience of speaking with Krasner very important.

“Most of us, in addition to being students here, are voting here, which means we’re constituents of Larry Krasner as district attorney, and like all constituents anywhere, it’s really important to be able to have contact with your representative, hear their views, and understand what they’re doing,” Kronenberg said. “I just think it’s important to be informed voters and informed citizens.”

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THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021

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OPINION THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 16, 2021 VOL. CXXXVII, NO. 19 137th Year of Publication DANE GREISIGER President ASHLEY AHN Executive Editor HADRIANA LOWENKRON DP Editor-in-Chief ISABEL LIANG Design Editor CONOR MURRAY News Editor PIA SINGH News Editor HANNAH GROSS Assignments Editor BRITTANY DARROW Copy Editor KYLIE COOPER Photo Editor ALFREDO PRATICÒ Opinion Editor SUNNY JANG Audience Engagement Editor BRANDON PRIDE Sports Editor LOCHLAHN MARCH Sports Editor SOPHIE HUANG Video Editor QIANA ARTIS Podcast Editor ALESSANDRA PINTADO-URBANC Business Manager RAUNAQ SINGH Technology Manager JASPER HUANG Analytics Manager GREG FERREY Marketing Manager EMILY CHEN Product Lab Manager ERIC HOANG Consulting Manager

THIS ISSUE ALANA KELLY DP Design Editor JONAH CHARLTON Deputy News Editor

How Penn let its international students down, again Guest Column | Too many new students were left without assistance on how to transition to college in the United States

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hen I first stepped on campus on Aug. 25, I felt a strange symbiosis of familiarity and unfamiliarity, having finished my first year of college completely online from my home in China. Locust Walk bustled with activity as first years headed off to yet another New Student Orientation event while I, a sophomore, found myself lost on my own college campus.

As a result of COVID-19 travel restrictions, many international students from the Class of 2024 were forced to stay home and finish their first year online even after Penn opened its campus in spring 2021. I myself was subjected to Presidential Proclamation 9984, which restricted travel from mainland China.

So while many local students who were on campus for the spring semester have had the opportunity to explore the area, we have not; while many have acquainted themselves with the greater Philadelphia community, we have not; while many have befriended each other in a face-to-face setting and found their friend groups, we have not. In other words, many sophomore international students — not only at Penn but all around the country — have the same needs as first years arriving on campus for the first time.

In light of this situation, colleges in the United States such as Amherst College, Swarthmore College, and Northwestern University offered international student orientations not only to first years but also to those who had not been on campus before. Aside from the usual campus tours and social events, these orientations included sessions about opening an American bank account, getting a phone number, working on and off campus legally, and coping with cultural shock.

Furthermore, some of them provided free transportation to shopping centers so that international students could acquire items they may not have been able to bring from home. They were designed specifically to help international students who are arriving on campus for the first time and in need of familiarizing themselves with campus, the surrounding area, and American social culture.

Prior to arriving on campus, many international students in the Class of 2024 reached out to the International Student and Schola r Services about establishing an international student orientation specifically to support those who were not on campus during their first year at Penn. However, ISSS turned down the request in an email, citing difficulty pinpointing those students and accommodating an additional orientation within the established NSO schedule.

If the University had kept their international students’ needs in mind and planned an optional international student orientation in advance, more of us would have arrived on campus early to participate. In addition, it would have given the University ample time to plan out

ANA GLASSMAN Opinion Photo Editor

NICKY BELGRAD Associate Sports Editor

VARUN SARASWATHULA Deputy Opinion Editor VALERIE WANG Deputy Opinion Editor BRANDON LI Design Associate ALICE CHOI Design Associate TYLER KLIEM Design Associate BECKY LEE Design Associate KIRA LU Copy Associate

ELIZABETH XU Copy Associate THOMAS CHEN Copy Associate

LETTERS Have your own opinion? Send your letter to the editor or guest column to letters@thedp.com.

Editorials represent the majority view of members of The Daily Pennsylvanian, Inc. Editorial Board, which meets regularly to discuss issues relevant to Penn’s campus.

Participants in these meetings are not involved in the reporting of articles on related topics.

MAYA PRATT

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feel like there is a common expectation – told to us by college alumni and by media representations of college life – that one’s college years are where you find your “lifelong friends”.

For some people, this may be true. For me, finding close friends at Penn has been a challenge. I’d like to share my journey and suggest a framing for friendship that allowed me to accept what I cannot control.

In short, I remind myself that some friendships are ephemeral: they last for a short time and then fade away. During the pandemic, I would contemplate whether “something was wrong with me” when a friend would not respond when I reached out to them. I would think, “Am I overly formal? Am I too much of an old soul to connect with other twenty year olds?”

Counteracting these unproductive thoughts, I remind myself that people move on. Some friendships come into our lives for a reason, a season or a lifetime. However, college may not be the time where we all find our close friends.

One’s early-20s may be a fruitful time to cultivate close relationships, yet Snapchat’s Friendship Report also found that people of different generations found their closest friends at different ages.

My conception of friendship has evolved since I was younger. I moved from Nevada to California when I was ten years old, which was a big change for me, leaving behind friends I had since I could talk. I had difficulty making friends at my new school, hoping that one of my close friends from Nevada would move to California (that hope would not come true). I switched schools three times in three years, but luckily, I found friendships in high school that I am grateful to remain in touch with.

When I started at Penn in August 2018, my understanding of relationships had been altered significantly. During my senior year of high school and summer before I started college, I had a falling out with two close friends and my parents finalized their divorce after 21 years of marriage. Once I got to Penn, I coped with this by diving into my classes and clubs.

Over the past few years, I compartmentalized my friends in my clubs, which, in part, is a reason I have had trouble making deep connections. My desire for structure has led me to invest time in clubs without also making time to casually “hang out” with friends, but that is something I am trying to make more time for this year.

Friendships evolve with changing circumstances, which are

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often out of our control. Friends may leave a club you shared, they may graduate early, or a pandemic may distance you to the point where you lose touch with them. Despite all the uncontrollables, we can still decide how to invest our time and energy into others.

I would like you to answer these questions: Who makes you laugh? Who comforts you when you’re feeling down? Who accepts you for who you are?

If you think of someone (or multiple people), then they may be the ones you would benefit from spending more time with.

I know I feel the happiest when I am with the people who make me think deeply, laugh heartily and smile widely.

If you have difficulty thinking of anyone right now, that’s okay. The great thing about college is that there is a wide array of people who will be pleased to meet you.

I am in my final year at Penn, and I am still figuring out who my close friends will be. I don’t have it “all figured out,” and I doubt any other upperclassman does. We all have challenges with friendships, no matter our age.

If I recognize that a friend does not respond after multiple attempts to reach out, I let it be. Whenever I face an interpersonal hurdle, I remind myself of the 3 P’s developed by positive psychologists: “It is not personal, not permanent, and not pervasive.”

I would discourage measuring your self-worth based on whether or not you have any close friends at Penn yet. I have fallen into this trap many times (I still do), yet I have lived to tell the tale. I still have one more year to go, and I am optimistic that I may find close friends this year. Whatever happens, Penn has taught me a lot about relationships and how to manage them.

If you remember one thing from this column, please remember this: you are worthy of belonging. If you have not found a close friend yet, practice patience and keep looking. If they do not appear this year, they will likely grow sometime later, perhaps in a place you would not have imagined.the community about police brutality.

Despite being ranked as the number one school for safety and security, danger on Penn remains prevalent. The combination of Penn’s detrimental actions, harmful police activity, and increased crime makes it more important than ever for students to remain alert and aware as they return to school. Members of the Penn community must be mindful of their actions and be held accountable for the ways in which they have contributed to safety issues, but at the same time, every student must remain vigilant for the sake of their own personal well-being. All students deserve a fulfilling college experience stocked with social contentment, but that cannot be attained without attention to safety.

It is important to be aware of what safety resources Penn has to offer. For instance, the 24/7 walking escort service is a great way to ensure a safe arrival home, especially for female students walking alone at night. The service can be requested at 215-898-WALK (9255) or by asking any public safety officer on duty. For more information on the Division of Public Safety and other Penn safety resources, visit https://www.publicsafety. upenn.edu/.

JADEN CLOOBECK is a College senior studying psychology from Laguna Beach, Calif. His email address is jaden@sas.upenn.edu.

LEXI BOCCUZZI is a College sophomore studying philosophy, politics, and economics from Stamford, Ct. Her email is abb628@sas.upenn.edu.

BRANDON LI

JESSE ZHANG is a College and Wharton sophomore studying marketing and communications from Shenzhen, China. He was the DP’s summer multimedia editor during 2021. His email is zhexi@ wharton.upenn.edu.

Cloobeck’s Call | We can’t control our friends’ actions, but we can control how we view friendship

AGATHA ADVINCULA Deputy Opinion Editor

Lexi’s Take | The danger of politicization and performance in public health policies recently reposted a tweet by the British rapper Zuby which read, “You can be in favor of something but opposed to it being mandatory. You can be against something but not in favor of it being banned.” While I don’t typically look to the music industry for political commentary, the tweet did a great job of stating what I believe to be obvious: vaccine and mask mandates have undoubtedly entangled political rationale with regard to matters of public health, a decision that is going to have drastic consequences for the future of crisis response and the ethos of leaders in the public and private sector.

Since the start of the pandemic, public officials have had to balance life and livelihood in mitigation policies. Too harsh, and public liberties and the economy are crippled, leading to mass protests and public outcry. Overly laissezfaire responses, on the other hand, can lead to overrun hospitals and a great toll on human health.

More recently, that same balancing act has been necessary for vaccination efforts and mandates. While vaccination mandates in the United States are nothing new, they existed in scenarios vastly different from what we are currently encountering. Previous vaccine mandates, such as those for Varicella, occurred following FDA approval. This is unlike the COVID-19 vaccine that was mandated in many sectors (such as universities, employers, and recreational engagement) prior to even the recent FDA full approval of the Pfizer-patented version of the vaccine. Mandates prior to FDA approval, which is our country’s primary means of regulating pharmaceuticals, are not only illogical but very confusing to the populace. If the government doesn’t trust the vaccine enough to approve it, why should you be forced to receive it? Despite this approval occurring, the Moderna and Johnson & Johnson vaccines have yet to receive full FDA approval and many areas of the country predominantly had access to those versions of the vaccine.

It is also vital to understand the climate in which the vaccine development actually occurred in the first place. Unlike any other vaccination, the coverage of Operation Warp Speed was extremely public. While this allowed people to stay informed about the vaccine, it also led to an oversaturation of information: both truthful and misleading. Concerns about implications for fertility or clotting, which would have typically been debated behind closed doors in the medical community, were hashed out on mainstream news networks.

These issues decrease trust and encourage apathy towards public health recommendations. With regular “renegotiation” of the “rules” of this pandemic, people — particularly those who are young and less likely to have severe implications accompanying a COVID-19 diagnosis — are losing their inclination to follow rules which are subject to change. This phenomenon is anecdotally obvious on Penn’s campus. Our vaccination rate stands at 97%. Yet, we have an indoor mask mandate. Who is the mandate protecting? Shouldn’t vaccines be enough?

The vaccine has been proven to be very effective, and “breakthrough” infections (when vaccinated people contract COVID-19) are rare, occurring in about 10,000 out of 100 million vaccinated individuals. Further, those breakthrough infections are very frequently asymptomatic. In a recent Philadelphia Magazine piece that highlighted rising delta variant infections, Drexel and Temple epidemiologists explained that a “hypothetical chain of transmission [among vaccinated people] on its own isn’t necessarily a reason to mandate universal indoor masking, including among the vaccinated.” It is also important to consider that cases in Philadelphia and similar areas with high vaccination rates are substantially lower than their peaks during the pandemic.

The question could be asked then: Why require masks?

Frankly, the issue of motivations for Penn’s requirement is unimportant in light of how apathetic the University is at enforcing some of these COVID-19 policies. At the recent Second-Year Orientation “Class of 2025 Photo” event on Franklin Field, I saw that masks were sporadically worn and only enforced when it was time to take our photo. This atmosphere held true at most other orientation events as well.

Penn’s apathy is also evident in the unclear policies regarding contact tracing and quarantining once exposed.

According to University procedure, vaccinated students are not required to quarantine in every instance of exposure. In addition, they must complete a PennOpen Pass each day, despite the fact that passes are not being regularly checked upon entrance to classes and it’s been nearly impossible to sit through a lecture these first few weeks where someone — if not the whole room — is coughing up a lung, a symptom which should produce a red pass. It seems that neither the students nor the University have any appetite in actually enforcing the PennOpen Pass system. The University has been similarly touting a 1% positivity rate and zero-classroom transmission, despite the fact that there has been zero enforcement of mandatory testing. Whether you support the aspirations of Penn’s COVID-19 response or not, the reality is that many of these policies exist in name only.

This in and of itself is not an argument against the effectiveness of masking and or testing as a way of curbing the spread of the virus. It is, however, a reflection on the lack of follow through by Penn’s administration to enforce policies that they publicly support. By the same token, it highlights the issues with Penn making claims about positivity rates without regularly testing all — or even most — of the student body. If the University doesn’t value legitimate carry through of these policies, why should we be subject to them?

While I encourage you to do what makes you feel safe, I also ask that you join me in refraining from exercising judgment on issues of my personal health based on politicized reasoning. Misdirected government initiatives are bad, lack of personal choice is dangerous, and politicized public health is a slippery slope that won’t stop with COVID-19, whether it’s at Penn or the country at large.

The lack of trust in the legitimacy of our institutions’ guidelines poses a grave threat to future health responses, and officials should be wary of the long-term damage they are causing. This is reflected in recent polling, with 1 in 5 Americans saying they trust both the NIH and the CDC “not very much/not at all.” Wherever you stand politically, you should find the implications of this alarming in our country’s ability to handle not only this public health crisis, but any that we may encounter in the future as well.

Some college friendships don’t last a lifetime

SAMANTHA TURNER Sports Photo Editor

TIFFANY PARK Copy Associate

a schedule and reserve physical spaces for the orientation to be held.

The existence of an extensive New Student Orientation demonstrates Penn’s awareness of its responsibility to support new students as they settle into a new and perhaps intimidating environment. However, the University failed to take sophomore international students who had never been on campus before into consideration. Without a proper introduction to campus life in America, international students would likely be held back by their comfort zones and fall into homogenous groups, thereby minimizing the diverse experience that being a student at Penn can be.

Before the University moves on, let us not forget that 14% of the Class of 2024 are international students, many of whom were not able to travel to campus in spring 2021. That is 14% who did not know Penn Mobile would make residential life easier; 14% who had to figure out the where, when, and how of opening bank accounts as well as getting a U.S. phone number on their own; 14% who were and still are dealing with the complexity of going to school in a different country.

I do not wish to wallow in self-pity simply because I have managed to orient myself arousnd campus without the help of the University. Those of us who were not on campus last year have proven ourselves capable of adapting to a new environment by supporting each other. However, if the University had held a proper orientation for us, maybe we would not have had to go the extra mile when familiarizing ourselves with the Penn experience. The University had the opportunity to support its international students, and it fumbled.

Are we placing politics above public health?

THEDP.COM | THE DAILY PENNSYLVANIAN

Not in my name

EDITORIAL

Penn is dropping the ball on helping students in quarantine

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n Tuesday, College Dean Paul Sniegowski sent an email to students saying that Penn is optimistic the fall semester will be conducted in person. An in-person semester is certainly welcome news for Penn’s student body, many of whom expressed excitement when it resumed last month.

However, with the return of students on campus comes an increase in COVID-19 risk. Although Dean Sniegowski noted the risk of COVID-19 transmission in classrooms is relatively low, it is not zero. Moreover, students may easily be exposed to COVID-19 outside of the classroom. Although 97% of faculty and students are vaccinated, those with a positive COVID-19 test will be forced to quarantine.

Penn’s plans for accommodating quarantining students have thus far been inadequate. In the Dean’s email, he said the School of Arts and Sciences has urged instructors to make class materials, such as recordings, lecture notes, and office hour access, available for those students who must miss class due to exposure. While this is a good first step, it is not enough; Penn instructors can vary wildly in their policies, and some professors may choose to be inflexible, incentivizing sick students to come to class. For the good of the student body, faculty, and other members of the Penn community, Penn must make flexibility across different classes mandatory.

Specifically, the University must ensure that no student falls far behind or is punished for missing an exam, class, or recitation if they are experiencing COVID-19 symptoms or exposure.

Even when faced with a mandatory policy change, professors do not always follow University direction. For example, on Sept. 2, Penn suspended operations, which meant the cancellation of all classes. However, some professors did not follow

OPINION 5

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021

this directive, instead holding classes via Zoom. If a mandatory order isn’t entirely effective on its own, a voluntary directive will likely do even less.

Having flexibility would benefit students in several ways. Most obviously, it would allow them to focus on their health, rather than forcing them to attend class. In addition to keeping themselves safe, it will also prevent other students, staff, and University professors from being exposed to one source of potential COVID-19 cases.

Additionally, it’s not just students who would appreciate this flexibility. Recently, over 225 professors signed a letter requesting Penn allow instructors to make their own decisions on teaching classes inperson or online. While mandating flexibility for sick students won’t accomplish this, it would address one of the primary concerns for many of these professors: the possibility of coming into contact with students who are sick or have COVID-19.

Some may argue that making classes accessible through online learning makes class optional. However, there are ways to combat this. For example, professors could be asked to record classes if there are individuals under isolation, or who report being sick. In addition to requiring recordings under certain circumstances, the University could incentivize professors to record classes for all. Some professors have already indicated that they are doing as such, citing non-COVID-19 benefits of recorded classes.

For a year and a half, COVID-19 has disrupted all aspects of life, including academics. As the Penn community moves further in the fall semester, there will no doubt be future COVID-19 cases that hinder learning. To prevent this from being the case, the University must step up, and mandate accommodations for those students who cannot attend class due to quarantine, illness, or a positive test.

MAX MESTER

Penn, what’s your quarantine plan?

Isabella’s Impressions | Penn needs to address the dilemma posed by roommates and COVID-19 exposure

Guest Column | The Center and Program in Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies should not misuse Penn’s name for political purposes

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ecently, I read on Twitter that the Penn Center and Program in Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies formally endorsed a petition entitled “Gender Studies Departments in Solidarity with Palestinian Feminist Collective” that accuses Israel of “apartheid,” rejects any notion that “both sides” have valid complaints, and calls on feminists worldwide to support the Palestinian “right to return.” I feel compelled to speak up.

Universities are centers of academic learning whose primary mission is the pursuit of knowledge and the search for a deeper understanding of the world around us. The University itself should not support any group’s political activism, no matter how righteous some members of the group feel their cause is. When I came to Penn, I was instructed by my faculty mentor that I was not to use my Penn letterhead for any purpose that was not related to my scholarship.

Though I was tempted — when I applied for a mortgage, when my favorite candidate didn’t win the nomination — I never did so. I always kept in mind that it would be improper for me to use the Penn name for my individual interests, personal or political.

So I wonder: For whom does Penn CPGSWS speak? The Center’s faculty? The majority of women at Penn? When one uses the Penn name, the answers to these questions should be clear.

Each of us at Penn is free, even welcome, to express our political views publicly as long as we do so forthrightly under our own name.

What we are not free to do is conceal our names under a university heading or impute our individual views to an entire community.

The document signed by Penn GSWS is also problematic because it precludes healthy intellectual debate. The document implies that the Israeli-Palestinian conflict should be viewed exclusively through the lens of antiracism, feminism, colonial str uggles, and intersectionality. Would the Holocaust, terrorism, antisemitism, and pan-nationalism not also be reasonable lenses? More importantly, would a student in GSWS feel comfortable bringing up such questions in a classroom?

Something has gone amiss. Individual student groups can lobby for one political faction (e.g. Penn Law Students for Justice in Palestine), but that is not the role of the University or any faculty-sponsored center. Universities receive enormous benefits from the federal government — scientific funding, non-profit status, etc. They are the beneficiaries of great philanthropy from alumni. The legitimacy of a university rests on a belief that faculty will contemplate difficult questions, confront their own biases, and submit their findings to skeptical

critics. The legitimacy of a university will be threatened if we move towards a different model, where intellectual pursuit takes second stage to political activism.

I also note that “inclusion” is central to Penn President Amy Gutmann’s Penn Compact. My own department chair coined the mot to for Pen n’s Chem ist r y Depa r t ment: “Whoever you are and wherever you are on your journey of scholarship, you are welcome here in Penn Chemistry.” I wonder whether Israelis would feel included at Penn GSWS. This idea recalls the Eat Up the Borders Instagra m post from the sum mer: “We want to provide a platfor m where we can gather a round a t able to sha re h istor y, cult u re, language, and most impor tantly, FOOD. In order to best serve our guests, we decided to remove one of our food vendors for Sunday’s event so that we could deliver an optimal experience to all. This decision came from listening to the community we wish to serve and love.” Apparently, if you love your community and want to promote a multicultural experience, but find that not everyone wants to get along, the way to be inclusive is to disinvite the Israelis.

At Penn, do we want a university where departments are held to the same standards as food truck block parties in West Philadelphia?

And what if not everyone agrees on who the enemy is? Will every Penn department start endorsing political positions — a pro-Palestinian GSWS Department, a pro-Israel Jewish Studies Program, a pro-fracking Chemical Engineering Department, an anti-nuclear power Earth and Environmental Sciences Depa r tment?

Will students segregate themselves in politically like-minded dorms? If we walk down this path, we will inevitably produce students who are unable to engage rationally with each other, which will further increase America’s political polarization.

I am by no means suggesting that a Penn faculty member or student must be apolitical. I also understand that in certain disciplines, it may be difficult to disentangle elements of intellectual pursuit from political activism. But that said, Penn’s mission and credibility are undermined when a University center and program endorses a political movement’s talking points instead of promoting meaningful scholarly discourse.

JOSEPH SUBOTNIK is the Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn endowed term professor of Chemistry. His email is subotnik@sas.upenn. edu.

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SAMANTHA TURNER

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hen I took MATH 114 as a first year, I thought I had reached an unparalleled level of confusion; however, reading Penn’s contradicting web of COVID-19 policies and protocols, I reached entirely new levels of confusion, frustration, and stress.

I currently live on campus with a roommate — common conditions for a first year but less common for juniors. Though we share a living space, my roommate and I are not one person: We work different jobs, attend different classes, and grab lunch with different friends, returning each night to our dorm as we do homework, grab snacks, and sleep. This natural f low of events, however, makes it such that both of us are at risk of contracting COVID-19 even if only one of us is exposed.

In fact, just this weekend, my roommate was exposed to COVID-19, forcing me to take a hard look at Penn’s policies. My roommate’s exposure to COVID-19 not only put me on edge, but also revealed the deeply f lawed system Penn has in place for those unable to socially distance. While we are both vaccinated and she did not contract the virus, the lack of clear guidance from Penn felt risky and insensitive.

On Penn’s COVID-19 policy page, they explain that the purpose of contact tracing is first to “trace and monitor contacts of infected people,” and secondly to “support the quarantine of contacts to prevent additional transmission.” The second point here would imply that those who have been exposed should be quarantined alone. So what happens when the exposed individual has a roommate? This seems like a question that should have been anticipated by Penn, but instead they have no solution.

When I was put in this situation, I was left with no choice that I truly felt comfortable with; I either had to rely on other friends to house me for a few nights until my roommate tested negative or go home. While these options were available to me, not every student at Penn

has access to these avenues. Think about first years, many of whom haven’t even lived at Penn for a full month. They may not have forged the kind of friendships where they feel comfortable asking another friend in the Quad, for example, if they could crash on their floor to avoid sleeping in the same room as their roommate. Other Penn students likely don’t live in the kind of vicinity to campus where traveling home for a weekend is a viable option: Even my two-hour drive home wasn’t ideal.

Penn’s lack of a stance on this predicament stems from the fact that students technically don’t need to quarantine if they are vaccinated, depending on the type of exposure they had with an infected individual. Students, however, have varying comfort levels, personal health situations, and general anxiety that puts them in an uncomfortable situation when left to share a room with an exposed roommate. Penn needs to address this situation because my personal experience is not an isolated incident.

It is not only a matter of personal comfortability, it also remains a serious public health issue in light of the decreased vaccine effectiveness and breakthrough cases caused by the Delta variant of COVID-19. Those who have spent their first year at Penn pre-COVID-19 will undoubtedly remember the pervasive nature of common colds, where seemingly everyone in ECON 001 would be coughing, sneezing, or blowing their nose. Now take those same living conditions and throw in a highly transmissible, deadly virus. It is not unreasonable for the student body living on campus to ask Penn to create a safer environment and possibly create more quarantine housing to separate roommates where one is exposed and the other is not.

ISABELLA GLASSMAN is a College junior studying philosophy, politics, and economics from Suffern, N.Y. Her email is iglass@sas.

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6 NEWS

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021

THE DAILY PENNSYLVANIAN | THEDP.COM

PHOTO GALLERY

From Philadelphia to New York: Remembering the 20th anniversary of 9/11 Members of the Penn community gathered at the Love Statue last Friday to remember the lives impacted by 9/11, including the 16 Penn alumni who lost their lives. The next day, people from around the country came together in lower Manhattan to pay tribute. Here’s how people commemorated the event, 20 years later.

KYLIE COOPER

Students, faculty, staff, and community members attended Penn’s commemoration at the Love Statue.

People raised white flowers to the sky following a moment of silence on College Green.

President Amy Gutmann bowed her head during a moment of silence on College Green.

A family member of a victim of 9/11 held an American flag as he looked up at One World Trade Center.

A plane flies over the Tribute in Light.

A mourner wiped away a tear at the North Pool of the 9/11 Memorial.

American flags that had been placed by families of the victims lined the sides of the 9/11 Memorial pools.

Two little girls looked at a photo of a victim that had been taped to the North Pool.

A woman made the sign of the cross after setting down a candle at the 9/11 Memorial in Jersey City.

People photograph the Tribute in Light and the New York skyline in Jersey City.

THEDP.COM | THE DAILY PENNSYLVANIAN

Penn hopeful entire semester will be in person after finding low COVID-19 transmission Penn has a positivity rate of 1.11% and a 97% vaccination rate among faculty and undergrads CONOR MURRAY News Editor

As some schools switch to online learning and tighten COVID-19 safety restrictions, Penn maintains that inperson classes have not led to virus transmission.

In a Tuesday afternoon email to students in the College of Arts and Sciences, College Dean Paul Sniegowski wrote that the University’s latest COVID-19 dashboard update offers hope that the entirety of the fall semester can be conducted in person. According to the dashboard, Penn currently has a positivity rate of 1.11%, a vaccination rate of 97% among faculty and undergraduates, and no classroom transmission has been found. Cases on campus have instead been linked to off-campus, unmasked social gatherings.

La Salle University temporarily switched classes to a virtual format last week, after 43 cases were reported after Labor Day weekend, a significant increase from the previous week’s four cases.

Duke University implemented an indoor and outdoor mask mandate and suspended indoor group dining in late August, after more than 300 students tested positive. Similarly, 82 positive cases at Brown University prompted administrators to halt in-person dining, increase mandatory testing, and restrict social gatherings.

Yet at Penn, Sniegowski maintains that the University’s in-person format is associated with a “very low probability” of COVID-19 transmission because of its mask mandate and high vaccination rate.

To maintain a low positivity rate, Sniegowski emphasized that both students and faculty must follow the University’s COVID-19 safety protocols. He reminded students and faculty to wear masks that cover both the mouth and nose at all times in indoor spaces. Students, faculty, and staff must also complete daily PennOpen Pass symptom checks, and students who receive red passes should not come to class. Students who feel sick

should also not attend class, Sniegowski wrote.

The School of Arts and Sciences has urged instructors to provide access to lecture notes, class materials, recorded lectures, and online office hour meetings for students who cannot come to class due to illness, according to the email. Instructors have also been asked to promote study groups to provide backup for students who miss class and to implement makeup policies for students who must miss examinations due to quarantine or isolation.

Penn welcomed students to campus for in-person learning this fall for the first time since March 2020.

First years and sophomores, who are taking classes on campus for the first time, told The Daily Pennsylvanian last week that they have largely enjoyed the in-person experience so far.

NICHOLAS FERNANDEZ

Students walking down Locust Walk on Aug. 26.

Some profs. continue to teach remotely despite in-person semester Faculty members can request an exemption from in-person teaching due to medical concerns DELANEY PARKS, KOMAL PATEL Senior Reporter, Staff Reporter

Despite Penn’s decision to resume an in-person semester, some professors are teaching virtually this fall due to health concerns and departmental decisions.

Professors who are teaching virtually are adding more hybrid opportunities for student support, such as additional online office hours and in-person recitations. After having adapted their instruction methods for the last year and a half, many of these professors said those changes are here to stay — at least for now.

Immediately upon learning of the University’s plans for in-person classes in April, Statistics and Data Science professor Paul Shaman said he got permission from his department chair to teach his classes virtually due to personal COVID-19-related health concerns.

Faculty members who qualify for an exemption from in-person teaching this fall can request a medical accommodation through the Office of Affirmative Action and Equal Opportunity Programs, and instructors who need an exemption for non-medical reasons, such as an at-risk family member, can request an accommodation from a department chair or dean. Still, more than 225 instructors are petitioning the University for the ability to make their own choices regarding class formats, even as administrators remain firm on their commitment to provide an in-person experience this fall.

Shaman is teaching one undergraduate course – “Forecasting Methods for Management,” cross-listed as STAT 435, STAT 711, and STAT 535 — and one graduate level course — STAT 520: “Applied Econometrics I” — virtually. The cross-listed course has a maximum enrollment of 130 students, while the inperson class would have been capped at 75 students.

Shaman said he actually has more contact with students now than he did during in-person classes before the pandemic.

“I’m giving separate office hours for the two classes, whereas when I was on campus, I would have one set of office hours and students from both classes would come,” he explained.

Shaman said his classes are synchronous but recordings are made available to students afterward — which, he said, means that students can access them multiple times if they want to review or attend a class they would otherwise miss. ​​”It’s very, very convenient,” Shaman said. “As long as the students are accepting of it, that’s fine.

I will add that some students have told me that they prefer online; it gives them more flexibility.”

Shaman is not alone in seeing benefits for virtual instruction.

Deirdre Martinez, the director of the semesterlong Penn in Washington Program, has found ways to incorporate pandemic-inspired virtual instruction into her in-person course this fall, PSCI 398: “The Future of Conservatism and the GOP.” Martinez said she is co-teaching the course with Evan McMullin, a 2011 Wharton MBA alumnus, who uses Zoom to tune into classes from Utah.

“Of course, [there’s] great value to being in a room together. But we’re taking what we learned from when we did have to pivot to remote learning,” Martinez said. “I think we can really enrich the learning experience with it.”

Using Zoom in the classroom has made it possible to invite more guest speakers than ever before,

NEWS 7

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021

Martinez said. Similar to other professors, Martinez added that the technologies that academics have now become familiar with will be a positive tool in the future.

“I don’t know what the post-COVID-19 world is really going to look like,” Martinez said. “But I do think, in this case, you would never have been able to get dozens of the most important people talking about and thinking about the future of the Republican Party to talk to the students in one class on campus. We do that all the time in D.C., because they’re physically there.”

Other instructors were told by their respective departments and school administrators to teach online this semester.

Organic Chemistry lecturer Alyssa Bohen is teaching two courses, CHEM 244 and CHEM 249, with an in-person lab component and an online asynchronous lecture. She said the accessibility of online lectures is helpful, and wrote in an email to The Daily Pennsylvanian that the recordings can be an asset with difficult topics because students can rewatch them.

Bohen added that while students have appreciated the online lectures, they seem excited to get back to in-person lab work.

For statistics professor Warren Ewens, the decision to teach online was made by “higher-ups” in the Wharton School, he said. As a result, Ewens is teaching STAT 111: “Introductory Statistics” asynchronously this semester with in-person recitations and two virtual sections that each have about 150 students.

About 10 other courses across the College, Penn Nursing, and the Wharton School have also been online since the beginning of the semester.

Ewens believes the reason for the University’s decision to keep his class virtual may have been partly due to the large class size, which could cause some students in the back of the lecture to struggle to hear him speaking through a mask. Ewens said he’s heard that some professors have been struggling with projecting and being heard through masks.

Some students have also recently told the DP they’ve experienced COVID-19-related struggles in classes, like soft-spoken professors wearing two masks and a recitation being held online with poor connection, even though they overall said they’re enjoying in-person learning.

Like Shaman, Ewens believes the recorded format is more convenient and that the lectures end up being shorter and more concise, but he added that there’s “definitely something lacking” when it comes to forming closer connections with students and answering their questions in class. In-person instruction is also less scripted and influenced more by the questions students ask, he said, comparing virtual instruction to a TV performance.

“You miss the interaction with the students,” Ewens said, adding that it can be difficult to gauge students’ understanding of the material in a remote setting.

“With an in-person class, if you’re trying to explain some point, and you look at the faces of the students in the class, you can usually tell whether they understood that point if their faces light up, or something like that,” Ewens said. “Of course, that’s not possible in a recorded lecture.”

Kite & Key resumes in-person tours for prospective students Tours will not be allowed inside any buildings, including the Quad and Huntsman Hall RACHEL MILLER Contributing Reporter

Kite and Key resumed in-person tours for prospective students on Sept. 8 after moving all tours online to limit the spread of COVID-19.

While there will still be optional virtual programming, Kite and Key and Penn Admissions said the return of in-person tours will help prospective students engage with the Penn community. Campus tours will be offered Monday through Friday, and be very similar to tours conducted before the COVID19 pandemic. Students will not be allowed inside any buildings, however, including the Quad and Huntsman Hall, where tours used to stop. The tours will serve as stand-alone events with information sessions available virtually, instead of in person in Claudia Cohen Hall as in the past.

In-person tours will be offered most mornings at 10:15 a.m. and in the afternoons at 1:45 p.m., with a few midday tours available at 12 p.m.

Prospective students coming to tour campus may only bring one guest with them. Both the prospective student and the guest must wear a face covering, attest to receiving the COVID-19 vaccine, and practice physical distancing. Tour participants must also complete a health screening on PennOpen Campus, a version of PennOpen Pass for visitors, and receive a green pass.

Kite and Key President and College senior Steven Wren said he believes the in-person tours will be safe, especially because they are entirely outdoors.

“I’m just excited to get the ball rolling and show people what life at Penn is really like,” Wren said.

For prospective students who are unable to make it to campus, there is also in-depth programming available online. In addition to live virtual information sessions, there are live student-led virtual campus tours every Wednesday at 8 p.m. during which prospective students can watch a tour guide narrate a virtual campus tour and ask questions.

There is also an interactive virtual tour that prospective students can take at any time.

The decision to return to in-person programming was not an easy one, director of visit experience in the Office of Undergraduate Admissions Thomas Bergstrom said, but it was important for prospective students to see campus in person.

“As Penn resumed in-person experiences, the University, Admissions and Kite and Key members

KYLIE COOPER

all agreed that it was important to resume safe, inperson ways for our prospective audiences to engage with Penn,” Bergstrom said.

Virtual programming also extends Penn’s daily visit offerings beyond campus, making tours and information sessions more accessible to prospective students, Bergstrom said.

Kite and Key is hosting panels for prospective students to experience Penn virtually. One of these options is a series entitled “Digging Deeper Panels,” which features Penn students from underrepresented backgrounds sharing their experiences at Penn.

Another option for virtual programming is live student chats where prospective students can ask Kite and Key members questions about the University in a casual and intimate setting, Wren said.

These meetings are held in small groups on Zoom.

Tour guides are excited to return to in-person programming, with increased volume and frequency of tours.

Kite and Key communications director and College junior Julia Fiedor said each tour guide will once again be conducting tours weekly instead of a few times per semester as they did during the pandemic.

“Doing tours in person just has such a different feeling,” Fiedor said. “Going on these tours just makes you fall in love with Penn again every day.”

Meet Whitney Soule, Penn’s new dean of admissions Before joining Penn, Soule spent 13 years at Bowdoin College LEANNA TILITEI Staff Reporter

After spending 30 years working in college admissions at small liberal arts colleges, Whitney Soule — Penn’s new dean of admissions — has taken the helm of the second-largest Ivy League institution’s admissions office.

Soule said she is not coming to Penn with the intention of enacting major changes to the admissions process. Instead, she hopes to continue and expand existing initiatives with active input from her colleagues.

“I did not come here with a plan, ‘Penn needs to do X, Y, and Z,’” Soule said. “It’s not about fixing a broken thing, but it is an opportunity to continue this conversation. I think, as an office, we will look for and create opportunities that are not here right now.”

One of those opportunities is the option to submit a non-teacher recommendation when applying to the University.

Penn previously required students to submit two teacher letters of recommendation, but in the current admissions cycle, it will require only one teacher recommendation. The other letter of recommendation can come from anyone who can comment on the student’s character.

“It could be a friend, a community member, a leader, a contributor – anyone who has a view on that student that would help us understand them,” Soule said. “Students can still select a second teacher if they want, but not every student has teachers that they know really well and they feel could really honor that question. We want them to pick somebody who can because that’s what we’re trying to learn about.”

She also explained that the new policy was made in an effort to reflect the Admissions Office’s efforts to evolve traditional practices to better suit students’ non-traditional high school experiences as amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

As students return to campus life this fall, Soule said she has noticed the sheer size of the University more than ever, as it is much larger than her previous places of work.

“I just stopped and watched on Locust Walk and coming from a small school I thought, ‘Oh my gosh, this is so many students,’” she said.

But Soule, who served as the Senior Vice President and Dean of Admissions and Student Aid at Bowdoin College for 13 years, said Penn is not all that different from Bowdoin, despite the nearly 8,000 undergraduate student difference.

“Bowdoin is a school that was built on the common good, so in some ways very much like Ben Franklin’s ethos and disposition toward putting good things into the world,” Soule said. “When Penn was looking for a new dean, I saw it as an opportunity to take the things that I already love and care about into scale at a place that also already loves and cares about them.”

Soule began her new post at Penn on July 1 after the University announced her appointment as dean of admissions on Feb. 9. The search process for a new dean of admissions began after Eric Furda, the beloved former Dean of Admissions and 1987 College graduate, announced he would be leaving the Admissions

Office on June 18, 2020.

“Whitney shares our strong belief — proven true in Penn’s growing strength and continued success — that excellence and diversity in higher education are inextricably linked,” Penn President Amy Gutmann and Provost Wendell Pritchett wrote in the Feb. 9 announcement.

Soule said she will bring one key principle that has shaped her outlook on college admissions to Penn: it is okay not to have everything figured out.

“Students don’t have to be fully complete right by the time they start college,” Soule said, “Or on the other side of it, they don’t have to be complete by the time they finish. There’s no such thing as a complete person.

You’re always evolving into the next thing. We’re trying to help students think about their application as a point in their time. Just tell us who you are and what you think about at this point in your life – you don’t have to have it planned out.”

This belief was a guiding principle in making a number of changes to the Bowdoin admissions process.

Soule added an optional video response to the application process, so that applicants could provide additional insight into their experiences. She also advocated for the use of test-optional admission practices, which have been in place at Bowdoin since 1969, in her previous positons to make the admissions process more accessible to underrepresented populations.

As Soule prepares to welcome her first class as dean of admissions this winter, she said she has been enjoying adjusting to life on campus — one that is five times the size of what she is used to. She urged students to say hello if they recognize her on Locust as she acclimates to her new home.

“Having not been part of selecting the current classes at Penn, I don’t have the benefit of connecting a name to a story in an application. Everybody is new to me,” she said. “I am making an effort to make myself present on campus, even if it is just sitting there to have lunch or walking around. I want to be where students are, and I want to get to know students.”

8 SPORTS

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021

THE DAILY PENNSYLVANIAN | THEDP.COM

Penn football’s wide receiving core features depth and leadership

Mia Shenk notches first Penn women’s soccer hat trick since 2011 in 4-0 victory

SAMANTHA TURNER

Senior forward Mia Shenk kicks the ball across the field in a game versus UIC on Sept. 2.

SPORTS | Shenk’s three-goal output marks just the 15th such performance in program history MATTHEW FRANK Deputy Sports Editor

After notching a loss and a tie in the last two games, Penn women’s soccer (3-1-2) came up with a decisive 4-0 win on Sunday against George Washington (0-6-2).

The victory came after senior forward Mia Shenk absolutely dominated the first half, recording a hat trick in just under 40 minutes of play. Her three-goal output was just the 15th such performance in program history, and the first since Clara Midgley scored three goals against New Jersey Institute of Technology in 2011.

The onslaught began when Shenk scored on a goal that was set up by sophomore midfielder Lauren Teuschl’s pass to the far post on a corner kick. Shenk got the jump on her defender and cleanly headed the ball just inside the far post.

Then, just 33 seconds later, as the Red and Blue had the Colonials under pressure in their own territory, senior forward Abbey Duncan stole the ball and passed it to Shenk, who kicked the ball into the back of the net yet again to bring the score to 2-0.

At 33 seconds apart, Shenk’s scores had the

second-lowest time between goals in program history. First place in that statistic came when Ayla Gustafson scored two goals at 25 seconds apart against Lehigh on Nov. 1, 2000.

Once she scored the second goal, the crowd wondered if Shenk would be able to attain the elusive hat trick, and their question was answered in the 40th minute, when she scored her third goal of the day. The goal, which was assisted on by senior midfielder Lucy Kellogg and junior defender Peyton Raun, marked the first Penn women’s soccer hat trick in roughly a decade.

After riding the hat trick high into halftime, the Quakers cruised through the second half.

In the 57th minute, junior midfielder and forward Sizzy Lawton came up just short of a goal as the ball hit the top crossbar, but freshman forward Janae Stewart was there to rebound it and score the first goal of her career as a Quaker.

In addition to Stewart, Shenk, and the players that assisted on those goals, sophomore goalkeeper Laurence Gladu also played a big role in the team’s victory. Over the course of the game, she earned four saves and didn’t allow any goals in what was her second shutout so far this season.

Penn women’s soccer will look to keep up their positive momentum on Thursday at 6 p.m. against Villanova at Rhodes Field.

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Penn football’s wide receivers demonstrated in 2019 that they are forces to be reckoned with.

After the prior season was canceled due to COVID-19, the Red and Blue will be back out on the field for the first time in nearly two years on Sept. 18 against Bucknell. Here are some returning wide receivers, as well as some newbies, to look out for this season.

Two of the Quakers’ star seniors include Ryan Cragun and Rory Starkey Jr., who were both named to the 2021 Phil Steele Preseason All-Ivy League Team. Cragun hails from San Juan Capistrano, Calif. During his breakout season as a sophomore, he caught a team-best 58 passes for 885 yards, averaging 98.3 yards receiving per game. This performance earned him the Harry Gamble Football Club Award for distinct athletic achievement as well as the honor of second team All-Ivy. Cragun ranked third in the Ivy League in receptions, receiving yards, and receiving yards per game, and ranked second in the Ivy League for catches per game. He earned the fifth-most receiving yards in a single game in program history and received a Stats FCS National Offensive Player of the Week Honorable Mention on Oct. 28, 2019.

Starkey Jr., an Atlanta native, is another strong presence on the field. During his breakout sophomore season, he played in nine games. He notched seven touchdowns — a team high — and made 39 catches for 643 yards. Starkey Jr.’s seven

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touchdown grabs were good for third-best in the Ivy League. His performance marked the first season since 2000 in which Penn had two receivers with 640 yards or more.

Senior Owen Goldsberry, hailing from Arlington Heights, Ill. is the only other senior wide receiver on the team. In 2019, he appeared in six games, returned two kickoffs for 54 yards, made two tackles, completed one pass for 80 yards, and threw for one touchdown.

The Quakers have three sophomore wideouts who are looking to get some playing time for the first time this season. All served as captains of their high-school teams.

Joshua Casilli from McMurray, Pa. earned all-state honors in 2019, and was named Almanac MVP and a Kennywood All-Star that same year. Tanner Duve, from Culver City, Calif., led his high school squad to the Ocean League title in 2019. In addition to earning first team All-League honors, he was also named Offensive Player of the Year for his team.Sterling Stokes, from Oakland, Calif., led his team to the 2018 North Coast Section Division 2 Championship.

Junior Malone Howley is also hoping to get some game action this season for the first time in his Penn career.

The Red and Blue have four freshmen eager to start their first college season. Julien Stokes, from Newbury Park, Calif., won the Camino League championships, earned the title of 2019 Acorn MVP and 2019 All-CIF. Clay Petry, from San Diego, and Davis Ellis, from Jacksonville, Fla., were three-time letter winners and served as team captains of their respective high school teams. Kobe Comizo, from Greenwich, Conn., also served as team captain in high school.

He was a member of Greenwich’s undefeated 2018 State Championship team, and earned All-Region honors in 2019.

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On the left, wide receiver Rory Starkey Jr. catches a throw on the Nov. 17 game versus Cornell in 2019.

On the right, wide receiver Ryan Cragun runs with the ball on the Nov. 2 game versus Brown in 2019.

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SPORTS 9

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021

VOLLEYBALL CAN’T GET BACK ON TRACK AGAINST LEHIGH, FALLS TO 3-4 ON THE SEASON SPORTS | The Quakers put up a good fight with four close sets EASHWAR KANTEMNENI Sports Associate

KYLIE COOPER

Junior outside hitter Autumn Leak kills the ball over the net in a set vs. Canisius on Sept. 4.

On the road against Lehigh, Penn volleyball lost a hard-fought match in four sets, dropping its overall record this season to 3-4. Though the Red and Blue had their chances, they ended up losing 3-1 (25-21, 22-25, 27-25, 25-20) in front of an enthusiastic Mountain Hawk crowd.

In the first set, the Quakers fell behind early, going down 7-3 after a 4-0 run from Lehigh, and despite their best efforts to get back into it, they could not keep pace. Down 20-15, the Quakers started to mount a rally with a service ace by junior defensive specialist and libero Caroline Douglas to make it a 21-19 ballgame. From there on, Penn couldn’t seem to find its footing, however, and stumbled as the Mountain Hawks took the first set by four points, 25-21.

The second set seemed to be going the same way as the first for the Quakers. Lehigh once again took an early lead, and despite Penn briefly going ahead, Lehigh rallied and ended up leading 15-11 at the media break. However, from there on, momentum started to shift in the direction of the Quakers.

Junior outside hitter Madeline McGregor spiked the ball right into the ground, as Penn completed a four-point run to tie it at 16-16. Subsequently, junior outside hitter Autumn Leak took over with four consecutive kills, and McGregor once again spiked it into the ground to give Penn the 22-21 lead. Lehigh tied it up right after, but three consecutive points by the Quakers, including a set winner that saw senior opposite hitter Margaret Planek get thwarted the first time but earn the kill on the rebound, gave Penn the second set, 25-22, and tied the match up at one set apiece.

In the third set, the teams went back and forth from the beginning, with Penn taking a 15-13 lead at the media timeout on a failed relay volley from Lehigh off a Planek shot. The Mountain Hawks soon went on to tie it up at 18 apiece, but from there on, the game was once again dominated by Autumn Leak, as she led the Quakers to a 22-19 lead, causing Lehigh to call timeout. The Mountain Hawks were able to use that rest to their advantage, taking a 24-23 lead but immediately gave

up a point on a service error.

On the next point, Penn’s sophomore outside hitter Emerson Flornes earned a kill to make it set point for Penn. The Quakers, however, were unable to capitalize, as Lehigh’s Hannah Wright hammered home a ball to tie it, and two costly attack errors by Penn gave Lehigh a 2-1 set lead, as it won the third by a score of 27-25.

The fourth set once again started back and forth, with six ties in total. Lehigh tried to pull away with an early lead, but Penn hung in tough, cutting the deficit to 15-13 at the media timeout.

The Quakers were able to tie it up at 17 apiece, but that was the turning point in the set, as everything seemed to go wrong afterwards.

Kills by Lehigh’s Wright and Sabrina Lancaster, as well as a Penn attack error sandwiched in between them, gave Lehigh a 20-17 lead that it would never look back on. Penn got within two twice at 20-18 and 21-19, but the Mountain Hawks immediately scored back to back on two Emily Stewart kills and closed it out from there in front of their home fans, winning the final set 25-20.

Despite failing to take advantage of several chances to win the match, there were many bright spots for Penn to take away from the game. In a tough environment, the Red and Blue took a Lehigh team energized by its home fans to four nailbiter sets, and Autumn Leak tied her career-high with 21 kills, including six in the second set alone.

Impressively, she hit 0.421 for the match overall.

This was Leak’s third game out of seven played in 2021 with 20 or more kills. McGregor also had a strong overall performance with eight kills, seven digs, a service ace, and an assist. Planek led the Quakers with 14 digs, freshman setter Sydney Ormiston had 30 assists, and Flornes and Douglas each had two service aces.

Next up for the Quakers will be two matches on Saturday at Temple for the Owls’ City Classic. They will take on the hosting Owls first at 11 a.m. and will then face Villanova at 3 p.m. before opening up Ivy League play against Princeton on Sept. 24.

GRACYN BANKS SCORES TWICE AS FIELD HOCKEY DOWNS DREXEL FOR FIRST WIN OF THE SEASON SPORTS | Penn has not lost to the Dragons since 2010 BRANDON PRIDE Senior Sports Editor

As the saying goes, third time’s the charm.

That was especially true for Penn field hockey Friday afternoon, as the Quakers (1-2-0) defeated Drexel (1-4-0) 5-3 to secure the team’s first win of the season.

After losses against two top-five ranked opponents, including reigning national champions University of North Carolina, the Quakers found more success against unranked Drexel.

Though the first quarter was mostly defensive, a pair of underclassmen broke open the game for the Red and Blue. Sophomore forward Allison Kuzyk scored a close-range goal off an assist from charging freshman midfielder Sophie Friedman in the 12th minute. Kuzyk tallied her second goal of the young season with the strike.

The Quakers didn’t take long to find the net again, as senior captain Gracyn Banks scored less than two minutes later off a penalty corner. Banks would later score her second goal of the game in the third quarter when her shot ricocheted off a Drexel defender’s stick and into the back of the cage.

“We really executed what we’ve been working

PADILLA BACKPAGE

she will have the chance to show everyone that sports are a critical part of our relationships, our culture, and our lives.

HCE prides itself on developing athletes as both players and people, and it aims to build a family-focused culture that supports athletes that train there.

“We take kids when they get in, [from] the ground up and develop them the whole way through, not just as basketball players, but as people,” Padilla’s HCE trainer, Jared Lloyd, said.

“We’re a faith-centered and family-centered program. Faith and family are the two most important things, and basketball is obviously pretty important as well.”

The HCE values off-court contributions just as much as on-court ones, making Padilla a logical choice in the decision to select an ambassador of the brand.

Off the court, Padilla runs an online platform The Sideline Post, dedicated to giving student-athletes a place to tell their story. She has also helped Lloyd train some of his younger players, serving as a role model for young athletes eager to follow a similar path.

“I always wanted to bring in someone that, to me, really understood our brand and has been a part of our brand,” Lloyd said. “To me, there was no better person than her. I came to her, and I said we should try to do it, and [we] put a line together.”

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Senior captain Gracyn Banks hits the ball down the field in the game versus Drexel Friday afternoon, Sept. 10.

on in practice with redirecting and trying to track on angles, so I thought we came out strong and it went really well,” Banks said.

Senior midfielder Ashley Wetzel scored an unassisted goal early in the third quarter, the Red and Blue’s only unassisted goal of the afternoon.

After the scoring flurry to finish the first quarter, both sides were able to detain the other, and the second quarter featured strong defensive play and no goals scored.

The Dragons made a push early in the third, getting two shots on goal off long through balls.

Unfortunately for Drexel, however, the team was unable to convert on both attempts, missing short left and wide right.

Finally able to cash in on the offensive side, Drexel found the back of the cage later in the quarter to trim the Quakers’ lead to to 3-1.

In the fourth quarter, after Banks’ second goal, junior forward Julia Russo scored on a scramble in front of the cage to make the score 5-1, padding the

HCE also seeks to use basketball to build relationships and character that can last a lifetime. Its trainers and coaches know the power of basketball to unite people across barriers. Padilla also approaches the game this way, which made the partnership make even more sense to both her and the HCE team.

“It’s so much bigger than basketball for her,” Lloyd said. “She’s not just focused on the sport, but she’s focused on using the sport to build awareness. [She is] using sport for something way bigger, which is what we at Homecourt Edge believe as well. We’re using sport as a vehicle and [as] a tool for something way bigger than that.”

Padilla’s debut t-shirt and merch collection is only the beginning of her NIL efforts, and with her junior season approaching, she knows there will be more opportunities ahead.

“I’m excited for the season to start, because NIL started and I haven’t played since freshman year, so I feel like I’ve been kind of off the map since then,” Padilla said. “So, I think more opportunities might open up for me individually once we start playing.”

Padilla enters the 2021-2022 season as a contender for a first team All-Ivy selection. The junior will be a large part of the Quakers’ offensive game plan and will have the attention of Ivy defenses this winter.

When Penn tips off its season on Nov. 14 at Hartford, Padilla will once again have her on-court platform. Only this time, thanks to the new NIL legislation, she will have the chance to use that platform to continue to build her brand.

Quakers’ lead.

In what initially seemed to be ‘garbage time,’ the Dragons quickly scored two goals late in the fourth to trim the Quakers’ lead to two. Drexel nearly scored a fourth time, giving the Red and Blue a run for their money late and spoiling what had to that point been a solid defensive performance.

“The big takeaway was the game management piece. Clearly, that last quarter should not have been that way, but that’s on me,” coach Colleen Fink said. “We haven’t really gotten to that point yet as a team, in terms of our training and how we spend our time.”

Despite the late run by Drexel, sophomore goalkeeper Sabien Paumen recorded a career-high eight saves in the Quaker’s victory. Coach Fink singled out Paumen as a standout defender in the contest.

“We need to work on defensive organization as a whole,” Coach Fink said. “Everyone on our team individually is a good defender, but we’re not playing team defense right now… Individual defense

isn’t going to cut it.”

The Red and Blue were supported in the stands by a majority of the Penn women’s lacrosse team, who cheered on their fellow stick-wielders enthusiastically. Nearly every member of the women’s soccer team showed their support as well, in addition to many students and fans who were watching the team at home for the first time in almost two years.

With the win, the Quakers improve their all-time record against the Dragons to 12-6. Notably, this is Penn’s sixth consecutive victory against Drexel, not having lost a matchup since 2010, Fink’s first year at the helm.

“We always want to show that we can dominate Philly,” Banks said.

Up next, Penn will look to further the team’s claim to Philadelphia bragging rights as it competes at Villanova (2-2) on Sunday before returning to Vagelos Field on Friday for a showdown against Saint Joseph’s (2-2).

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JUNIOR KAYLA PADILLA PARTNERS WITH HOMECOURT EDGE BASKETBALL SPORTS | Padilla is one of the first Penn athletes to profit off of her NIL JOEY PIATT Sports Associate

On July 1, 2021, the NIL era arrived.

For the first time ever, student-athletes were able to profit off their name, image, and likeness.

The new legislation ushered in a plethora of brand deals and endorsements from athletes across all sports. These deals varied in size and scope. Some athletes opted to partner with large companies to endorse products, while others worked with brands near to their own passions and purpose.

Penn women’s basketball junior Kayla Padilla chose the latter when she took her first step into the wild world of NIL. Shortly after the legislation passed, Padilla partnered with Homecourt Edge Basketball, the trainer that she has worked with for the past decade. In collaboration with Padilla, HCE debuted the first piece in the HCExKP merch collection.

The shirt, titled the “KP Logo Silent Assassin T-Shirt,” captures Padilla’s Filipino roots, as well as key ideals of Filipino culture.

“I think, in Filipino culture, hard work and family are just two of the biggest things that they’re about,” Padilla said. “So, I think just representing that through a shirt introduces me and represents me.”

Padilla first joined the HCE family when she was in elementary school. Now, she stands as one of the Ivy League’s most formidable scoring threats. Her partnership with HCE, however, goes beyond just on-court performance.

To Padilla, basketball is a vehicle to something bigger, and as she continues her career with Penn, Junior Kayla Padilla’s relationship with Homecourt Edge Basketball sprouted when she was in elementary school.

SAMANTHA TURNER

SEE PADILLA PAGE 9

PENN MEN’S SOCCER SHARES A 2-2 RESULT WITH LOYOLA MARYLAND SPORTS | Graduate student Joey Bhangdia tallied his third goal of the season DUSTIN GHANNADI Sports Reporter

Although Penn men’s soccer led twice on Monday night against Loyola Maryland, the teams ultimately compromised for the draw.

Coming off of a heartbreaking loss against Penn State, the Red and Blue (2-1-1) were re-energized, ready to continue a solid start to their season. Having won two non-conference games prior to their contest against the Nittany Lions, they were eager for a win against a formidable Loyola Maryland team (1-2-1).

The match began slowly, with both sides tallying one shot in the first 10 minutes. However, Penn began to gain momentum, nearly scoring the opening goal in the 13th minute. An inside shot was saved by a strong glove from the Greyhound goalkeeper Chase Vosvick. This initial offensive spark prompted a strong run for the Red and Blue, allowing them to play in the upper half and exert constant pressure on the Loyola defense. However, a counterattack and close chance in the 22nd minute turned the momentum over to the Greyhounds.

As Loyola continued to gain rhythm, the team’s long balls consistently penetrated the Penn box, forcing goalkeeper Nick Christoffersen to make a few sliding saves. Loyola continued to increase the intensity on-ball, and started to dominate the possession.

Opening the second half, the Penn team re-enSEND STORY IDEAS TO DPSPORTS@THEDP.COM

tered the field upbeat. A long ball to the left side was sent to graduate student Joey Bhangdia, who bent the ball around the Loyola goalkeeper to put the Quakers up 1-0, tallying Bhangdia’s third goal of the season.

“We were trying to be a little more aggressive than we were against Penn State, [trying] to carry some more meaningful possession in the attacking half. In fact, to be fair, I felt that we did that…I did feel that we were building our way into the game,” coach Brian Gill said.

The Greyhounds quickly struck back, however.

Clever play in the box forced Christoffersen to attempt a sliding save, fouling a Loyola player. The resulting penalty kick was confidently put into the back of the net by the Greyhounds’ junior forward Daniel Tshiani, tying the game at 1-1 apiece.

As the second half continued to progress, the Quakers made pressing charges against the Greyhound goal. The pressure from Penn’s constant attacking was relieved once again in the 71st minute.

A long pass from the back found sophomore Michael Hewes, who dribbled the ball into the penalty box and passed it to freshman forward Charlie Gaffney for an easy tap in, putting the Quakers up 2-1.

However, similar to the previous goal, Loyola was quick to equalize. A incisive cross into the box saw the junior defender Matthew Lala head the ball into

NICHOLAS FERNANDEZ

Joey Bhangdia stayed hot with another goal against Loyola Maryland on Sept. 13.

the corner, overwhelming Christoffersen to tie the game at 2-2.

“We showed some good resiliency to get back into the lead and keep creating chances. That’s all we can ask,” Gill said. “Sometimes as a coaching staff, we have to be a little bit more patient with new players to come along and find their best form, and also the players have to recognize some urgency moments, too.”

As the game approached the 90th minute, it was clear that these two sides could not be separated. Despite some valiant, last-minute efforts by Penn, the game was sent to overtime.

The first 10-minute half of extra time was dominated by the Quakers, who cleaned up their passing and constantly created chances. They nearly found the net but were denied by the crossbar.

“One of the biggest things this season is to continue to work on our identity and just scoping out the

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main pieces of the team and the supporting pieces,” Bhangdia said. “We need to capitalize off of more chances and create more chances. The middle third has been a big thing for us and winning that.”

Overall, despite playing well and creating chances, Gill wants to see the team continue to improve.

“I think through the course of the season, we are going to have to teach ourselves some lessons.

Sometimes those lessons aren’t fun to learn, and in order to really handle a lead and the urgency it takes to handle a lead, every once in a while, you have to lose the lead,” Gill said. “We’ve tested that sometimes this year and that’s been a little bit of a challenge for our group, but I think the overall process of winning games and being successful at this level takes time.”

The Quakers will host Mount St. Mary’s (Md.) this Friday at 7 p.m., where they will try to extend their strong start to the season at Rhodes Field.

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