March 23, 2023

Is Penn changing its legacy admissions policy?

C ’26 C ’27

The DP found that the policy’s wording was refined during the Class of 2026 admissions cycle last year

Penn is refining its legacy admissions policy under Dean of Admissions Whitney Soule, according to interviews with 14 alumni, students, and college admissions experts.

During the Class of 2026 admissions cycle last year, Penn Admissions updated its information webpage for first-year applicants, internet archives examined by The Daily Pennsylvanian indicate. Nearly every word on the webpage stayed the same — except for the paragraph about legacies. This change was so subtle that, when it was brought to the attention of multiple college consultants and admissions experts, they said that this was the first time they had heard about it.

Penn’s longstanding definition of a legacy applicant — the child or grandchild of an alum — has not changed. However, Penn no longer implies that legacies should apply through the Early Decision Program to have the best shot

Vandalism at BioPond turns pond water red

Penn is investigating the situation after the pond was encircled by caution tape around surrounding trees

YASH RAJPAL Staff Reporter

Penn is investigating a case of vandalism at the BioPond this past weekend.

The BioPond, located in James G. Kaskey Memorial Park behind the Quad, turned a reddish color as a result of the vandalism. According to the University crime log published by the Division of Public Safety, an instance of vandalism of private property was recorded at the BioPond at 2:47 p.m. on March 18. The case is still active. "There was vandalism at the BioPond over the weekend that is being investigated, and we are working with groups across campus to determine the best way to clean up the damage and mitigate environmental impact," Kaskey Park Greenhouse and Garden manager Kathryn Butler wrote in a statement to The Daily Pennsylvanian.

Facilities and Real Estate Services declined to comment. The Office of Fraternity and Sorority Life and the Office of Environmental Health and Radiation Safety did not respond to multiple requests for comment by publication, and a request for comment was left with the University spokesperson.

"Environmental Health & Radiation Safety also responded to examine the BioPond for the safety and well-being of both people and the vibrant animal and plant biodiversity," Vice President of Public Safety Kathleen Shields Anderson told the DP on Sunday.

In addition to turning a reddish hue, the pond was encircled by caution tape wrapped around the surrounding trees. It remains unclear if the caution tape is part of the vandalism. Rocks in the pond were also stained red, and some red residue was

UC Townhomes developer, Philadelphia approach settlement

Penn, Drexel, and other local institutions could contribute to a “services-based” fund to support UC Townhomes residents

A proposed settlement between the owners of the University City Townhomes and the City of Philadelphia would have Penn contribute resources to a fund for displaced tenants.

at getting in. In addition, Penn has phased out admissions information sessions specifically for legacy families.

A subtle change in wording

“Legacies who apply to Penn — like all applicants — receive thorough consideration in the application process,” the policy now reads.

Under the previous wording — which admissions counselors have long used in the advice they give to families — Penn told legacy applicants that their status as a legacy would be given the “most consideration” during the Early Decision Program.

1986 Wharton graduate Laurie Weingarten, the president of One-Stop College Counseling and the parent of a Penn legacy graduate, said that Eric Furda, the previous dean of admissions, made it clear that applicants who wanted “any type of leg up” should

apply ED.

In response to a request for comment about whether the new webpage wording represents a formal policy change, Soule wrote to the DP that it is Penn Admissions’ practice to “recognize the legacy relationships among our applicants.”

“Like the rest of our application processes that evolve over time, we continue to adapt and refine our approaches,” Soule wrote. “When I joined the office, I wanted to ensure that the information on our website — and across all of our communications — was as clear as possible, and that it accurately described our current process for recognizing the legacy relationships among our applicants.”

Soule began her role in July 2021, and the Class of 2026 admissions cycle was her first

See LEGACY, page 6

IBID Associates, who own the UC Townhomes, and the City are close to reaching a settlement, multiple sources familiar with the negotiations told The Philadelphia Inquirer. IBID said they could not comment on the proposal under the terms of the negotiations. Both parties in the lawsuit held a settlement conference on March 17, according to the court docket. On March 2, a judge gave both IBID and the City until March 31 to complete discovery and until April 21 to make any motions for summary judgment.

If approved, the settlement would require that IBID provide $3.5 million for displaced tenants, equivalent to $50,000 for each displaced family distributed by a nonprofit third party, according to the Inquirer. In addition, another fund to support tenants through services will be arranged. Penn, Drexel University, and other University City institutions would contribute to this fund.

The settlement proposal would also give the city a half-acre of the land at 40th and Market streets to be used for future affordable housing. The rest of the property would remain under IBID’s jurisdiction for sale or future development.

“The highest and best use of that land is as a laboratory research facility,” IBID spokesperson Kevin Feeley told The Daily Pennsylvanian in February, before the news of a potential settlement. “And our preference was to find a buyer who would be interested in building a residence there, so the impact on the residents would be minimal.”

See SETTLEMENT, page 2

Penn Med eliminates administrative jobs in reorganization effort

The full reorganization plan will reduce “administrative overhead” by $40 million annually, according to an internal memo acquired by the DP

MARGOT SCHNEIDER Staff Reporter

Penn Medicine announced the elimination of several administrative jobs as a part of an ongoing reorganization effort.

In an internal memo obtained by The Daily Pennsylvanian titled "Going Forward Together," CEO of the University of Pennsylvania Health System Kevin Mahoney shared that Penn Med would lay off a “small number of administrative positions which no longer align with our key objectives.” The full reorganization plan will reduce "administrative overhead" by $40 million annually, according to the memo.

"The nation’s healthcare economy has been

completely reshaped by the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, bringing monumental changes unlike anything we’ve seen in our lifetime," Mahoney wrote in the memo. "We have planned carefully to ensure that our 49,000person strong organization can withstand these turbulent market forces, but we are not immune to their impact."

Mahoney told the DP in an interview that Penn Med, as with other national hospital systems, is currently facing macroeconomic pressure.

See JOBS, page 3

evident on the sign.

“If you have been wondering what is going on at the pond, there was some upsetting vandalism over the weekend that resulted in the discolored water, rocks, and other surrounding surfaces,” an Instagram story posted by the BioPond’s Instagram account read.

The modern Kaskey Park first opened as a research garden in 1897. The park was named after the son of Richard and Jeanne Kaskey, who funded the upkeep and renovation of the pond, and it is also home to the Department of Biology greenhouse. It is located between a number of the Biology Laboratories and the Anatomy Chemistry Building of the School of Medicine. FRES will undertake an effort to repair and clean the pond after the incident, while also trying to identify the cause of the sudden color change.

Penn Medicine will be eliminating several administrative jobs amid ongoing reorganization efforts.

Justice Haim H. Cohn Chair in Human Rights at the Faculty of Law of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Former professor awarded $1 million in case against Penn for denied tenure application rereview

Penn was found liable for denying Cathrine Veikos a second review of her application for tenure as a way of retaliating against her complaints of discrimination

A former Penn architecture professor was awarded $1 million after winning a retaliation lawsuit against Penn.

Penn was found liable for denying Cathrine Veikos a second review of her application for tenure as a way of retaliating against her complaints of discrimination by the University. Veikos was awarded $1 million from the lawsuit after the court issued a verdict in her favor. Veikos previously filed a complaint in 2011 in which Penn was found not liable.

Veikos’ attorney Julie Uebler declined to comment. Uebler's argument centered on alleging that Penn violated Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, focusing on Penn's reasons for denying Veikos tenure. In addition, Veikos claimed that Penn was not in compliance with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Act as well as the Philadelphia Fair Practices Ordinance.

In response to a request for comment, a University spokesperson wrote that Penn does not usually comment on litigation.

The court decided that Penn was not liable for denying Veikos her application for tenure or rereview her application because of her gender and status as a mother, as Veikos claimed. Veikos had allegedly utilized Penn’s child-care policy following the birth of her son to allow the extension of the tenure probationary period for junior faculty.

“Penn adopted the policy to make it clear that the tenure clock 'stopped,' and academic production was not expected during that year,” according to the complaint filed on Sept. 9, 2020.

In 2006, Penn approved the revised Policy on Extension of the Probationary Period that applies to granting tenure to associate professors. The

revised policy allowed professors to get an extension of one year of their probationary period if they were the primary or co-equal parental caregiver of a child. Veikos gave birth to her son in September of the same year and came back to work fully in the spring semester of that academic year, according to court documents.

During this time, Veikos was working on publishing an introductory essay as a separate book rather than as an appendix to her other book. During the 2009-2010 academic year, Veikos allegedly postponed her tenure application to the following academic year, when she would have the publishing contract for her first book, according to court documents.

On April 6, 2011, six of the eight faculty members of the tenured faculty in the Department of Architecture voted to grant tenure to Veikos, according to the documents. Five voted in favor of Veikos, but one faculty member allegedly changed his vote in a letter sent to the personnel committee on the same day with the voting results. The School of Design Personnel Committee voted against Veikos’s tenure with a vote of four against and zero in favor two days after.

In the January 2022 order denying Penn’s motion for summary judgment, the court wrote that Penn said it denied Veikos tenure because of questions raised regarding the "quantity and quality of her scholarship." Penn also said that Veikos was told to emphasize quality instead of quantity, which is “secondary to judgment of quality and of intellectual eminence.”

After complaining about the alleged discriminatory proceedings, the dean of the School of Design allegedly sent a letter to Veikos on June 30, 2011, terminating her employment, neglecting the prior offer that was made to Veikos.

sell the property to a developer who would use the space for housing and life sciences. They refused to renew its affordable housing subsidies.

The proposal has not been approved or finalized by the United States District Court, which is overseeing the case as a result of a lawsuit filed by IBID. The company sued the City and Councilmember Jamie Gauthier following the passage of legislation designed to prevent the UC Townhomes from being demolished and ensure the area remain residential. When IBID and Gauthier were unable to reach an agreement on the lawsuit, the case went to court.

The settlement will not become final until a judge signs off on it. Parties on both sides hope this will happen in the next few weeks, according to the Inquirer.

Controversy over the UC Townhomes has continued since 2021, when the Altman Management Company, a partner under IBID, announced plans to

These plans would force all 69 displaced households to relocate. Tenants received affordable housing vouchers that would allow them to move to other lowcost locations. As of February, around two-thirds of tenants had already vacated, according to IBID.

UC Townhomes residents have joined forces with Penn and Drexel students and housing activists to organize against the sale since it was announced. Protests over the past year have included an encampment on the UC Townhomes property and a protest in front of City Hall.

“We are here to make the universities uncomfortable,” College senior Gigi Varlotta, a member of Save the UC Townhomes and a leader of the protests, told the DP in February. “We know that they have influence over what happens with the Townhomes, and we know that once they commit real funds to the preservation, other institutions in the city will follow suit.”

Ukrainian visiting scholars spend year at Penn to continue education amid ongoing conflict

The program seeks to help Ukrainians whose studies were disrupted by the war

The Annenberg School for Communication and the Department of Russian and Eastern European Studies have created a one-year program to host graduate students from Ukraine who have been displaced by the war.

Russian and Eastern European Studies professors

Kevin Platt and Mitchell Orenstein founded the program to help Ukrainians continue their education after the war disrupted their studies. The program is running during the 2022-2023 academic year. Scholars underwent a selection process and were chosen based on merit and fit.

“There were a lot of applicants, and many of them were really talented, but the department eventually decided on a few that we felt like we could advise well with a future course trajectory and that fit the range of things we do in our department,” Orenstein said.

Kateryna Onyschenko describes herself as a visiting scholar because although she is taking courses and participating in research, she is not pursuing a degree. Her research focuses on questions regarding the basic principles of preserving peace

and security and why they are under threat today.

When the war broke out, Onyschenko was in her first year of a two-year master's degree program after studying law at the Kyiv-Mohyla Academy. When she was allowed to postpone the start of her second year due to the war, she decided to use the opportunity to come to Penn. She wants to work in diplomacy one day.

After the end of her time at Penn, she hopes to go back to Kyiv and resume her master's degree program.

“I think I can [go] back [to Kyiv], but I don’t know. We cannot make plans right now,” Onyschenko said.

Serhii Shadrin worked as a media manager at an IT company during the breakout of the war and had plans of going back to school to obtain a Ph.D. When a friend sent him a link to the program, he immediately applied.

“It has always been an interest of mine to go abroad and come to the U.S. to study. It was very interesting for me to see this perspective, especially since I was always interested in international relations and learning new cultures and meeting new people,” Shadrin said.

Shadrin is interested in studying the effects and development of Ukraine’s Ministry of Digital Transformation, which was launched under Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in 2019 to digitize Ukraine.

“I want to work in digital diplomacy. I just found this intersection of politics and the digital world that I really want to combine. That is why when I came here, I decided to take courses in East European studies and also take courses at the Annenberg School on digital and media studies,” Shadrin said.

His long-term plan has always been and remains to return to Ukraine and work in its Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Although Shadrin said he is thankful for the opportunity this program has given him, he added that it does not erase the difficulties of war in his home country.

"I still live in this Ukrainian informational sphere where I start my day by reading the news and my family and my friends are going through this daily experience of war,” Shadrin said. “I had a lot of challenges here, but of course it is much safer and better to be here than to be in Ukraine right now.”

“We need to go through and trim the overall expenses of running the health system,” Mahoney said. He added that the cuts are not random, but rather “looking at programs that we don't need to continue.”

Mahoney added that this will include the renegotiation of vendor contracts, the combination of corporate services, and the elimination of duplicative administrative systems and positions. In particular, strategic planning and marketing models will be consolidated, Mahoney said.

Mahoney told the DP that the “overwhelming majority” of employees in affected positions are being redirected to open positions in the health system. He said that others will either receive a severance package or aid with finding a new position. Penn Med has 49,000 staffers; the DP could not verify exactly how many jobs were cut.

“Many individuals have already moved into open corporate positions," a Penn Med spokesperson wrote. "Those leaving the health system will be provided with severance and continuation of benefits based on length of service."

Mahoney said that patient care remains Penn Med’s priority, and that some areas will see an

increase in clinical positions as a result of the reorganization efforts.

“I’m not taking away positions at bedside, I’m not taking away clinical positions,” Mahoney told the DP.

Penn Med also said that it believes that technology will fill in for many of the administrative positions. Mahoney said that, in the future, he hopes that patients can conduct much of their medical payments, appointment making, and insurance setup online without having to make phone calls. He also said that he hopes to use a portion of the saved funds to invest in research, which is one of the defining aspects of Penn Med.

In 2020, Penn Medicine predicted a loss of $317 million due to the suspension of non-urgent care, greater costs for COVID-19 patient care such as personal protective equipment, and low payment charges for patients.

Mahoney also told the DP that he plans to give salary increases and grow financially in the future, including a planned pay raise this spring.

“These are prudent steps to protect our future, and not desperation,” Mahoney said. “There’s no panic.”

of Pennsylvania

Penn, respect the rights of student workers EDITORIAL

Last Tuesday, a supermajority of undergraduate and graduate associates filed to unionize. The move from the group of RAs, collectively called the United RAs at Penn, comes after months of organizing and a wave of unionization efforts that have been sweeping the nation, Philadelphia, and the Penn community in recent years.

As this unionization process continues and the campaign approaches an official vote, we urge Penn to remain neutral. The University must allow student workers to make well-informed choices for themselves and allow the union to come to a vote.

With over 47,000 total employees and an endowment of $20.7 billion, Penn is one of the largest and most powerful institutions in the state — and they’ve leveraged this power against unionization campaigns in the past. When Penn Museum workers announced their intent to unionize in 2021, staff alleged that the Museum inundated them with misleading anti-union propaganda through flyers, emails, videos, and captive audience meetings. In 2018, after two years of campaigning for unionization, the graduate student group GET-UP withdrew its campaign to represent grad students on campus after Penn lawyers attempted to argue that those students were not legally workers.

In the summer of 2020, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, RAs and GAs organized around unsafe working conditions and a lack of communication

regarding their positions, among other things. When they approached College Houses and Academic Services and Penn leadership with proposals for a better contract, RAs allege that they were dismissed and chastised by administration. Beth Winkelstein, Deputy Provost at the time, refused any negotiation.

Union-busting is a common tactic employed by institutions and companies which often hire elite, expensive law firms to spread misleading or false information to discourage employees from voting for a union. Distributed information is often seemingly innocuous, disguised as factual guides and an encouragement from the employer for their employees to learn more about unions. According to a National Labor Relations Board case report, Penn hired three lawyers in midMarch associated with an employer-side labor firm that provides services to “avoid unionization through positive employee relations.”

Union-busting can also come in the form of legal battles and intentional delays to the electoral process. This March, Duke University intends to argue in court that graduate student workers are not legally employees under the National Labor Relations Act in order to delay a union election from taking place.

Union-busting can come in many shapes and colors, but one thing is clear: It is a blatant attempt to undermine the democratic process and workers’ federally protected rights to organize. Anti-union campaigns impede workers’ ability to

properly learn what unionization is and violates workers’ rights to a free and fair election.

We urge Penn to break from this past trend and not take advantage of the clear power imbalance between an elite university and a relatively small group of students. Allow the RAs and GAs to decide for themselves if they want to unionize. They have a right to an election without unnecessary delay and in an environment free of interference.

In her message to the University announcing her vision for the “Tomorrow, Together” campaign, President Liz Magill asked: “What does the world need from Penn? How do we cultivate a community that will rise to that challenge?”

The answer? We need a university that respects democracy and the will of its students as well as the contributions of its workers.

Penn prides itself on Benjamin Franklin’s vision of establishing the University as a “revolutionary institution of higher learning.” His dream has, in part, come true. Penn’s students, faculty, and alumni are some of the brightest minds and are constantly striving to make the University better for all. But Penn needs to recognize that sometimes, this change comes from within and not from above.

President Magill is right in saying that Penn’s next few decades hold unbounded potential and the recent announcement from the RAs is only a glimpse into that. Penn’s response to this campaign will set a precedent for what kind of university

How to make friends in a new place

Penn wants to be. Is it an institution that is willing to spend thousands upon thousands fighting its own students? Or is it a university dedicated to positive change, democracy, and creating a healthy, collaborative learning environment?

Penn’s immediate response won’t just affect RAs and GAs. Many of us on this campus are not just students, but workers too. Whether that’s working in a lab, a library, or a college house, we are integral to the functioning and thriving of this University. We all deserve to have a voice in our workplace, and we all deserve to be supported by the University. When student workers are respected, the entire campus benefits.

We urge Penn to set a precedent that we, the students, can be proud of. Remain entirely neutral and allow the RA union election to take place. Allow your students to be the self-driven, resourceful, and deeply engaged people you so often pride us on being, and let these RAs come to their own decision about the union. If Penn is planning for “tomorrow, together,” they cannot leave their students behind.

The Daily Pennsylvanian stands with our fellow students. Penn, we hope you do as well.

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.

stay in touch with my teammates after the season ended, which felt discouraging.

Instead, to maximize the chances of keeping a relationship alive, it is helpful to see people in multiple, consistent contexts. No matter how many one-off happy hours I attended, I learned the important lesson that it takes time and persistence to nurture lasting friendships. While it is enriching to meet a wide array of new people, connecting with those you have history with or people you have an affiliation with can help get you started.

During my final semester at Penn, I started a list and wrote out who I knew would be living in Washington and elsewhere.

Creating this “where people are living” list has served as a constant reminder that I am not alone. The list led me to reconnect with a high school friend who ended up mentoring me during my transition to Washington.

In the Notes app, I typed a simple question: What are new hobbies that I can try? I brainstormed ideas, including how I could get involved in the Jewish community and local theatre scene. I checked organizations’ websites, Facebook events, and Eventbrite. I also thought about what activities

helped me thrive during undergrad. Finding familiarity in new experiences motivated me to branch out to new people.

For example, I loved singing with Penn Hillel’s Reform Jewish Community (RJC), so I wanted to find something similar in Washington. In my research, I discovered Sixth & I Historic Synagogue, which offered services that reminded me of RJC. I’ve also built friendships through Moishe House, which offers Jewish events organized by and for young professionals.

Once you meet someone whose company you enjoy, try practicing a regular ritual with them. For instance, I reached out to a long-time Penn friend and a new Washington friend to go to see a show together at Arena Stage. Since that first request, we’ve built a habit of seeing shows together.

I continued this approach by focusing my energy on building friendships

through repeated encounters with the same people in similar settings.

For example, I regularly attended Sixth & I services, and I began to notice a recurring cast of characters. I focused my attention on these people and got to know them better.

However, making that first step to find friends in a new city can be tough.

Be prepared to ask and respond to the same questions: “What’s your name?

Where are you from? What do you do for work?”

Rather than ask people what they do, I recommend asking them about what they are interested in. By inquiring about how others spend their free time, you can quickly figure out if you share common passions or hobbies.

Of course, not every activity will result in close friendships. Last fall, I joined an intramural kickball league at the National Mall. Despite building team spirit and camaraderie, I did not

If you are graduating soon and looking to meet Penn folks in your area, I recommend checking if there is a regional alumni club near you, which are meant to connect alumni through social events.

I joined the Penn Club of D.C., which has been a nice outlet to meet local alumni. I’ve organized a young alumni happy hour and a visit to Planet Word Museum, and I’ve enjoyed big events like our Potomac River boat ride!

If there is one thing you take away from this column, I recommend connecting with people and researching organizations that can help you build a community.

Wherever your journey takes you next, community will be key to thriving.

JADEN CLOOBECK is a 2022 College graduate with a bachelor’s degree in psychology. He is a former staff columnist for The Daily Pennsylvanian. He works at the Milken Center for Advancing the American Dream in Washington. His email address is jadencloobeck@gmail.com.

Goodbye green space

C.H.’S SPIN| Recent construction projects threaten

A stroll down Locust Walk features the usual encounters: masses of people headed to class, loose herds of tour groups, locals accompanied by small dogs, and the occasional wanderer handing out flyers. On that walk, you may now find large fencing surrounding half of Houston Hall and scaffolding shielding much of College Hall. Campus life has jumped into full swing following the skepticism of opening up after two years of pandemic limbo. The people are back, and so is the constant need for construction.

Penn’s effort to always improve is often welcomed with open arms. The Quad renovations, while displacing future first years, are desperately needed following the barrage of mold and heating complaints, and the planned renovation of 1920 Commons is a popular announcement after the recent health violation reports. Although inconvenient, the work dividing the Perelman Quadrangle aims to accomplish the same feat of improving what is already there. However, some recent projects tell a different story. Instead of fixing up the parts of campus that are falling apart, Penn has prioritized being bigger over better.

As a result, green space is disappearing fast.

In a city already devoid of nature, Penn is rapidly urbanizing, eliminating the special parts of campus

— the parts that do not box you in, but allow you to explore. Whether it is snowing or hot outside, students congregate in the limited green spaces that Penn offers: They sit down for picnics, jump around for a game of spikeball, or lounge on travel hammocks.

Because of Penn’s urgent craving for urbanization, this sense of community can now only be found on Hamilton Village, College Green, or Hill Square.

Construction on a new performing arts center next to Hill College House will begin in the near future, covering up more green space in an effort to add rehearsal space. This Gutmann-era proposal is still in the works and reflects a general theme when it comes to Penn’s growth. The University leans toward expansion over improvement of existing buildings

— the prime example of this theme transformed oncampus housing a couple years ago.

New College House West — now named Gutmann College House — is notorious for (1) being the holy grail of on-campus housing and (2) upping the oncampus living requirement to include sophomore year. Less considered is the fact that Gutmann College House demolished a green space for students and the surrounding community in order to dazzle visitors with a big project.

Gutmann College House is undeniably spacious, accommodating, and modern, but instead of raising

Help shape Penn’s future

GUEST COLUMNIST

a new building over a park, the older college houses could have been prioritized. Stouffer College House and the Quad need their current renovations, but they could have been addressed a while ago before all the living condition complaints emerged. The high rises also need some of that attention after various recurring flooding incidents. Housing is in no need of expansion, just improvement.

The same can be said for Penn’s dining options.

Renovating Commons is a good first step, but Hill House should receive equal attention because it failed the health code inspection just as poorly. When the on-campus dining requirement rose from one to two years, dining facilities should have been modernized. That never happened, and now, Penn is scrambling to update its facilities and provide more dining options.

As for academic buildings, the Stiteler Hall and Graduate School of Education merger is much more in line with sustainable expansion on Penn’s campus. It prioritizes space and improves upon existing structures. The construction of Gutmann Hall — yes, it is entirely different from Gutmann College House — fortunately does not cover up green space, but it does reflect the problematic expansion of Penn’s campus which is frequently termed "Penntrification." Another example of this issue is the University City McDonald's, which has been shut down and will soon

be crammed into the first floor of a large Penn office building.

Buildings used for extracurriculars need their fair share of improvements, too. Performing arts groups compete for rehearsal space between the Platt Student Performing Arts House and Annenberg Center, but is construction of a new performing arts center on the far east end of campus going to help? Projects like the Annenberg Center expansion have a better chance at alleviating practice space issues because they provide faster relief and fix pre-existing issues rather than potentially inventing new ones.

I understand that flashy projects with large dollar signs grab a prospective student’s attention. Everyone wants a school that is academically flourishing and looking to accomplish more, but consider how Penn is steadily changing. What was once a recognizable, open landscape surrounded by academia may soon be a cluttered mass of urbanized buildings. Improving existing structures instead of building new ones is the only way to preserve the Penn that we chose.

chart Penn’s future

If we haven’t heard from you yet, there’s still time.

Both on campus and around the world, students, alumni, families, and friends are sharing their aspirations for Penn’s future.

Let me provide you with a small sample of the themes we’ve been hearing so far. Members of our community are interested in making interdisciplinary research as efficient as possible. They want to reimagine how Penn connects with individuals and institutions close to home and around the world. They have thoughts about how to redesign classrooms and curricula for students’ current needs, especially as we all ponder the pedagogical implications of, say, recent advances in artificial intelligence. And they’re curious about how Penn can ask old questions in new ways while identifying emergent issues that are also worth rigorously pursuing.

But what do you think?

As you may know, I chair the Red and Blue Advisory Committee, a group of students, faculty, and staff that President Magill has charged with leading a University-wide strategic planning effort called Tomorrow, Together. We are responsible for hearing from – and thinking about the interests of – our entire community.

We have been using this academic year to learn more about how diverse members of Penn can work together to understand our current strengths, challenges, and opportunities. So far, we’ve conducted more than 35 consultative meetings with over 400 members of the Penn community. We’ve collected written responses to some of our key questions from all 12 schools and from more than 30 other centers and units across campus. We’ve met with undergraduate and graduate student leaders, staff members, and faculty via Zoom and in person. We’ve hosted three open forums, including one specifically for students, and reviewed hundreds of responses

submitted through the Tomorrow, Together website. Our efforts, we hope, have also catalyzed discussions throughout campus about our shared future.

Your perspective and passions are unique to you.

Now is the time to share them and play a direct role in helping chart our University’s path forward. Getting involved is as easy as dropping us a comment online. I have read every single comment submitted so far, and I will continue to do so. Your participation will help inform our collective planning for where Penn goes from here. So, if you haven’t already, please submit your suggestions and ideas quickly and conveniently via our website.

The Committee will continue reading your online comments through the end of April. These important contributions will inform our recommendations to President Magill at the end of the academic year and will prove valuable as we begin the next phase of this strategic work over the summer.

Our Committee members are also eager to have a meeting with your group or team, which you can request by emailing tomorrow-together@upenn.edu.

We will schedule as many more of these as we can.

I encourage you to get involved. Ten, 20, or 50 years from now, when you look back at this pivotal moment in Penn’s history, you should be able to say that you made your thoughts known and helped chart Penn’s future. Take this opportunity, be heard, and join your Penn community in planning for tomorrow, together.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine brought the issue of energy security to the top of the global agenda, placing it on par with international concern about climate change. As countries, businesses, and individuals increase their efforts to move away from carbon-intensive energy, their actions will increasingly change how counties interact with one another, affect prospects for war and peace, and influence the pace of globalization.

In this talk, Professor Meghan O’Sullivan will explain how the drive to address climate change will be one of the biggest geopolitical forces of the coming decade.

Questions? Contact Anne Kalbach,

| By sharing your thoughts and suggestions, you have the power to help

as dean. On June 21, 2022, Soule said in a webinar that legacy is “one thing” considered by Penn, “but it doesn’t come in front of everything else,” citing how the majority of legacy applicants are rejected.

However, alumni and admissions experts told the DP that the new wording on Penn’s website added a layer of secrecy for applicants trying to understand Penn’s admissions process — or represented a quiet step toward eliminating the legacy policy completely.

“They’re just being less candid now,” Brian Taylor, a managing partner of the college counseling service Ivy Coach and an opponent of legacy admissions, said.

To James Murphy, a higher education advocate at Education Reform Now, the updated wording “dropped the most interesting thing” about Penn’s legacy policy.

With the update to the webpage, Murphy and other experts said the legacy policy is not as clear, leaving it up to a variety of interpretations. Richard Kahlenberg — who testified as an expert witness in the ongoing affirmative action case that is now before the Supreme Court — said that Penn’s wording change was “a baby step in the right direction” because it suggests that legacies receive consideration “like all applicants.”

“It really comes down to a question of how the preference works in practice, of course, not just what they say on the website — and that’s a hard thing to measure without data,” Kahlenberg said.

The most recent available figures on Penn’s ED legacy application pool show that 16% of the Class of 2022 ED applications were legacies. However, legacies constituted 25% of Class of 2022 ED admits, showing that legacies were more likely to get accepted than would be expected from their size.

For the Class of 2026 and Class of 2027 ED rounds, Penn Admissions stopped sharing data on legacy ED admits. When asked for these figures, Penn Admissions pointed the DP to the Penn Admissions Blog and Class of 2026 page.

“In line with the shift in what we share about admitted students, we chose to celebrate the students who were invited to the Penn community as individuals and in the ways that we got to know them through their unique combinations of identity, accomplishment, and talent,” a spokesperson for Penn Admissions wrote in an email.

At a Board of Trustees meeting last June, Soule told the board that 15% of the Class of 2026 were legacies, in line with previous years and the expectations of most experts that the DP spoke with.

The phase-out of First Fridays

Beyond the change in wording and the end of public ED legacy data, admissions experts said it was difficult to definitively say whether Penn is choosing to phase out legacy admissions. Some, however, said that the discontinuation of First Friday drop-in hours could be another potential indicator.

First Friday events began in 2012 under Furda “for Penn alumni, faculty/staff and their children approaching college age who have attended Penn Admissions Information Sessions … and participated [in] on campus tours, but have additional questions about the

admissions process,” according to the Penn Almanac.

Peter Arcidiacono, another testifying expert in the affirmative action litigation before the Supreme Court, said eliminating the First Friday events could be indicative of a policy change and cited increased offerings from universities like Penn for applicants from historically underrepresented backgrounds.

“With our increased presence in online programming and our focus on creating more digital resources over the past several years, we now have the ability to reach and engage with all of our audiences around the world — including alumni — in meaningful ways,” Soule wrote in response to a question about the status of First Friday events.

Penn’s philosophy on legacy admissions

Students, professors, and counselors said that the University could be downplaying its policy because it sees the days of legacy preferences as numbered due to increasing political and cultural pressure — or, more likely, the upcoming Supreme Court ruling on affirmative action.

“Changes in wording are a reflection of the changes in the political landscape,” Aviva Legatt, the founder of Ivy Insight Group, wrote to the DP regarding universities updating the language of their policies.

Taylor said the Operation Varsity Blues scandal has also helped put legacy admissions “on its last legs.”

According to 1972 College graduate Jeffrey Rothbard, whose son was ultimately rejected from Penn, some legacy donors have already turned away. He said that some alumni have voiced “disdain” when their children are denied, alleging that Penn’s evolving admissions practices are correlated with a “negative impact” on the endowment.

When Johns Hopkins University discontinued its legacy admissions policy, the school’s president said that the change was accepted by the alumni community. In addition, a 2010 report found “no statistically significant evidence” that legacy preferences on their own increase the likelihood that an alum will make a donation.

College sophomore Selena Rosario, the president of the First-Generation, Low-Income Dean’s Advisory Board, said she believed that any changes in policy wording or event offerings are being made by Penn to “save face” and “not garner more attention” rather than fully eliminate legacy considerations.

Her sentiments were echoed by College sophomore and Penn First Board Finance and Operations Chair Khaliun Dorjmenchim.

“In my opinion, [legacy admissions] places a step stool for someone who’s already seven feet tall,” Dorjmenchim said. “Because when you’re looking at it from the perspective of a first-generational constituent, you’re already so behind.”

Both of Engineering sophomore Spencer Ware’s parents went to Penn, but he said that the policy was “obviously unfair.”

“My ideal admissions process would be a bit more merit-based in terms of testing, accomplishments, and interests, just so that more people who deserve to go to elite universities get to, whether or not they come from wealthier or poorer socioeconomic backgrounds,” Ware said.

University leadership counters Penn

Med house staff union campaign

NLRB election approaches

as

Since the election details were finalized, house staff organizers alleged that Penn Med leadership has been spreading misinformation about the voting process

A National Labor Relations Board election for Penn Medicine residents and fellows who are seeking a union has been scheduled, allegedly prompting pushback from the University.

The residents filed for an election with the NLRB after the University failed to accept the demands for voluntary recognition sent by the Committee of Interns and Residents on Feb. 17. The election will be held in person from May 3 to May 5 at five locations, including the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, HUP pavilion, Penn Med Rittenhouse, Penn Presbyterian Medical Center, and Pennsylvania Hospital, according to the CIR.

The CIR is the largest house staff union in the United States and currently represents over two-thirds of Penn Med residents and fellows. Since the election details were finalized, house staff organizers alleged that Penn Med leadership has been spreading misinformation about the voting process.

Residents and fellows have expressed confusion about where they can vote. Program directors have reportedly been telling house staff that votes will only be counted if they are cast at the assigned location, according to the organizers.

A Penn Med spokesperson did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

While each department has an assigned election location to ensure votes are not counted twice, thirdyear internal medicine resident Jackson Steinkamp told The Daily Pennsylvanian that he received confirmation from the NLRB that house staff can vote at any location. Votes cast at non-assigned locations just require additional processing.

“[Penn’s messaging] makes things really difficult,” Steinkamp said. “Some people work 20-hour shifts;

some people work nights. We can have extremely busy schedules and finding the time to vote in person isn’t easy, even without restrictions on location.”

The organizers also expressed frustration with Penn Med's refusal to conduct the election by mail-in ballots, citing recent union movements at Stanford Healthcare and Montefiore Medical Center.

While in-person elections are legal under the NLRB, the organizers said that long hours and intense workloads will make in-person voting difficult for some residents, particularly those in surgery or anesthesia specialties.

As a result, organizers said that Penn Med should commit to a structured relief process to ensure that schedules allow every house staff member the opportunity to vote.

“We take Penn’s commitment to allow people adequate access to vote very seriously,” third-year OB/GYN resident Madison Sharp said. “A failure to commit to a structured relief process would only further justify the argument that Penn doesn't care about our opinions."

In response to the unionization campaign, Penn has hired Cozen O’Connor, a Philadelphia-based law firm that specializes in union avoidance, CIR spokesperson Annie Della Fera said. Della Fera said that this tactic is not uncommon among employers facing union campaigns.

Cozen O’Connor’s website outlines their labor relations and dispute capabilities and says that they “prepare for and respond to picket lines, strikes, lockouts, and other economic campaigns” and “help employers avoid unionization through positive employee relations.”

Cozen O’Connor did not respond to a request for comment.

The Penn Graduate Medical Education Office also shared “Facts 4 Penn Med House Staff,” a website that

Penn refutes allegations of direct investments in ‘adversarial’ entities after U.S. House inquiry

In an emailed statement to the DP, a University spokesperson refuted part of the committee’s claims

HALEY SON Staff Reporter

was “developed to provide factual information about unions,” with house staff. Organizers said that the website holds an anti-union bias.

The website warns that unionization “typically limits the discretion a Program Director would have to address individual concerns,” including days off and funding for professional expenses. It also encourages house staff to consider that unions only need the support of a simple majority.

“If a pro-union resident or other union organizer is ignoring you now when it is trying to gain support to win the election, you should think about how it might treat you if it wins the election,” the website said.

Sharp said that Penn leadership has been meeting with Penn Med departmental leadership to express their views on the union, who in turn meet with residents to share them.

Other messaging from the administration has focused on dividing the workers, Steinkamp said.

“Whether it’s different departments within residency or residents against attendings, the higher-up administration has been pitting us against each other and trying to convince us that [the union] is somehow bad for the institution,” Steinkamp said.

Organizers said that they anticipated and

A United States House of Representatives committee asked Penn for information about its endowment, citing alleged investments in “adversarial” entities.

On March 15, the U.S. House Committee on Ways and Means sent a letter to Penn President Liz Magill requesting information on three entities that Penn invests in which the committee has identified as “adversarial.” The letter asks Penn to identify the three entities and answer whether there has been an increase in these investments since the creation of the Penn Biden Center.

The letter defined the entities as “adversarial” because they are listed on at least one of four U.S. government lists that denote entities that the United States regulates or prohibits from licensing or receiving domestic exports. These lists are the Entity List, the Military End User List, the Unverified List, and the FCC Covered List.

“Adversarial entities are contributing money to the university endowments as part of the Chinese Communist Party’s infiltration of our colleges and universities,” Rep. Greg Murphy (R-N.C.) wrote in a press release. “We need to know if these funds are being used to gain influence over America’s current and future leaders.”

In an emailed statement to The Daily Pennsylvanian, University spokesperson Ron Ozio refuted part of the letter’s claims.

“Penn has no direct investments in the three entities referenced in the Ways and Means Committee letter, and rigorously complies with all regulatory and legal restrictions that apply to any foreign holdings,” Ozio wrote.

Penn’s comment contrasts with what Murphy

The United States House Ways and Means Committee sent a letter

requesting information about the University’s endowment.

Penn Museum union advocates for standardized pay in contract negotiations

Museum workers voted to unionize in August 2021, and they began in-person negotiations earlier this year

SOPHIA LIU AND HALEY SON

Staff Reporters

Workers at the Penn Museum are continuing to negotiate a new contract with museum administration.

Workers at the Penn Museum announced their intent to file for unionization in late May of 2021 with the AFSCME District Council 47 under the Museum and Cultural Workers Local 397. Penn Museum workers voted to unionize in August 2021, and the union has participated in contract negotiations since October 2021, according to Jessica Lubniewski, an academic coordinator in the academic engagement department.

The union — Penn Museum Workers United — is part of the AFSCME District Council 47, which represents various institutions and workers in Philadelphia, including the Free Library of Philadelphia and the Philadelphia Zoo.

Lubniewski previously told The Daily Pennsylvanian in 2021 that the Penn Museum engaged in a litany of “union-busting tactics” by sending brochures to workers to vote against unionization or by meeting with workers.

Negotiations began with weekly two-hour meetings over Zoom in October 2021, according

Penn

Liz

to Lubniewski — who is one of the four union representatives on the bargaining committee. She said that in early January, the union began all-day in-person sessions, adding that these negotiations have been more productive than they were when on Zoom.

“We came to some tentative agreements on some things that we've been negotiating for a long time,” Lubniewski said.

A Penn Museum spokesperson wrote to the DP that the union regularly meets with administration to address their demands.

“The University of Pennsylvania and the Union meet regularly to discuss bargaining proposals," the spokesperson wrote. "We will continue to work in good faith to address all open items.”

Lu Denegre, a conservation technician at the museum and a member of the union’s negotiating committee, said that recent topics of discussion included the use of contract workers, job security, and temporary employees.

According to Denegre, the union is currently finalizing the last outstanding issues of the negotiated contract's first section, which includes standard language and clauses about worker protections and other matters.

Denegre said the union will probably move onto pay and benefits in the next one or two sessions. They said that the ideal solution is a standardized pay structure for all employees. According to Lubniewski, workers at the Penn Museum make a lot less than colleagues employed in similar jobs across the University. She said that some library workers "make twice as much as workers in similar jobs in the the museum."

“Our top priority is increasing pay across the board for everyone in our unit," Lubniewski said.

Lubniewski said the union is particularly focused on including equitable pay raises in the contract.

“We want to help bring up the lowest-paid people to a more livable wage,” she said.

Lubniewski said that those making the lowest wages were hit especially hard when members of the union were not eligible for Penn's annual raise in July 2022. She added that union members were told that Penn was "saving the money for when our

Penn Museum

contract goes through” and have not received a raise in almost two years.

In addition to pay raises, Denegre and Lubniewski said job security and longevity of employment are high-priority issues on the table.

“We have a lot of term employees, which are people who work full time, but are on year-toyear contracts,” Lubniewski said. “We want to make sure that people have steady employment and aren't surprised by a lack of employment when a contract is not extended."

The union ultimately hopes that its efforts will improve employee retention. Lubniewski said that she has seen high turnover in recent years due to low pay.

The employees said that representatives from Penn first recommended that negotiations be moved from virtual meetings to in-person, all-day sessions, which both Denegre and Lubniewski saw as a positive sign. “It was a sign of good faith and showed Penn’s

prepared for this response from Penn and believe the messaging is not effective. They said they have received significant support from other hospital staff, including attending physicians and nurses. Sharp and Steinkamp added that they have not experienced or heard of other residents experiencing retaliatory acts.

The organizers also expressed solidarity with the growing number of residents who are unionizing across the country.

“It feels very cool to be a part of the larger movement that is resident and fellow unionization,” Steinkamp said. “Success feels more possible when you see other people do it and have lots of resources.”

Organizers said that they are continuing to use a grassroots approach to counter the administration’s messaging. Leaders in each department have been communicating correct voting rules to their residents. Organizers have also been in the process of creating fliers with clear instructions to hang around the hospital.

“We’re all doing our best to stay positive and make sure everyone’s informed because regardless of their stance on unions, everyone should have the opportunity to vote,” Sharp said.

and Committee Chairman Jason Smith (R-Mo.) claim Penn wrote in its response to another letter previously sent on June 9, 2022, which was sent to 15 universities asking whether each university’s endowment “had investments in adversarial entities” on the four U.S. government lists.

In its response to the June letter, Penn allegedly said that its endowment holds investments in three entities on the U.S. government’s lists.

Based on available public data, the March letter claimed that the percentage invested in listed entities is approximately $3.3 million out of Penn’s $20.7 billion total endowment holdings.

The most recent letter also claims that there is a relationship between recent revelations about the Penn Biden Center — including that the Center housed classified documents belonging to Joe Biden — and the committee’s review of University endowments and their investments.

“Public reports have also raised questions about foreign direct investment in the University of Pennsylvania and the relationship between those investments and the creation of the Penn Biden Center,” the letter went on to say.

The letter also alleged that the timing of the Penn Biden Center’s creation aligns with “members of President Biden’s family seeking business opportunities in China.”

On Jan. 18, the House Oversight and Accountability Committee sent a letter to Magill alleging foreign influences at the Center. The letter inquired about foreign donations and visitors to the Center after the discovery of classified documents.

intention that they would like to move forward,” Lubniewski said.

However, Denegre said that Penn has not been fully transparent about the negotiating process with the rest of the museum’s workers.

“When new employees start, they are often not even told that they are part of the union," Denegre said. "Many times supervisors are not able to answer questions about employment because they have not been given that information from their higher-ups."

Denegre added that the unionization efforts across Philadelphia — such as at the Please Touch Museum under the same Local 397 and the Temple University Graduate Students’ Association — have also been inspiring.

“We have a lot of excitement from our staff right now about the union,” Lubniewski said. "A lot of new employees are very excited that there's a union in their workplace and that they get to be part of it."

Anna Kalandadze competes in the 200-yard freestyle in Jan. 2022. The senior won two events at Ivy League Championships last month.

SWIM, from BACK PAGE

In both events

Kalandadze’s time showed significant improvement from her appearance in last year’s competition. In the 1650 free, she shaved off nearly 40 seconds to finish at 15:55.60 and jumped from 42nd in 2022 to 10th. For the 500 free, her time of 4:41.58 was over five seconds faster than last year’s performance where she placed 49th.

“My approach to the sport definitely changed this year,” said Kalandadze. “I started looking at it as more of a fun thing to do instead of putting all this pressure on myself to do really well all the

time.”

While for some on the outside, the dramatic improvement in just a year might come as a surprise, for coach Mike Schnur, these results were a long time coming.

“This doesn’t come out of nowhere,” he said. “When you go that fast at the end of the year, you see it as a coach from day one.”

With Matt Fallon of the men’s team unable to compete due to an undisclosed injury, Kalandadze was the only member of Penn swimming and diving who went to NCAA Championships this year. With the rest of the team done for the season, she trained alone yet was still able to achieve success against a high level of competition.

Kalandadze competed against not only the top

of their events.”

collegiate competition, but also some of the top swimmers from around the world. Her final heat included Erica Sullivan, an Olympic silver medalist in 1500 free, Paige McKenna, the defending national champion in the 1650 free, and Kensey McMahon, who has two national titles to her name.

Kalandadze added that having experience at nationals last year helped her to block out any noise.

“I definitely learned how to keep my nerves in check this time around,” she said. “It’s pretty intimidating swimming against the best swimmers in the world.”

Schnur was impressed not only by her performance, but also her ability to overcome any fears associated with swimming alongside such

conference championship trophy.

impressive competition.

According to Kalandadze, “When you’re there, you just have to remember to have fun and enjoy the experience because just getting there is a great accomplishment in itself.”

After her performance in Tennessee, some might consider her in that elite group of best swimmers in the world, but for Kalandadze, that was never a goal of hers — she just swims because she loves it.

As she looks towards next year, Kalandadze has her eyes set on climbing the podium into the top eight, which would mean a spot as a first team All-American. However, for Schnur, his hopes for Kalandadze are far loftier.

“The goal is to get first,” he said.

a 9.825, but the 48.775 left Penn in third place in the second session after the first rotation. In the second rotation, the team moved to floor. Sophomore Emma Davies received the second-highest score of the night with a 9.9 for her routine, the same as last year’s championships and her career high. She was followed by freshman Marissa Lassiter’s career-high-tying 9.875. Becker complimented the stability and excellence of Penn’s freshman class, saying “every freshman has scored a 9.8 or above on at least one

Penn’s season-high 49.075 on floor moved the Quakers into the lead heading into the third rotation and vault. This event was led off by Kerico’s Yurchenko full, which received a 9.775 — the second-highest score of the night. Sophomore Olivia VanHorn’s 10.0 start value vault, the handspring pike half, closed out the rotation with a 9.7. Despite the 48.525 team score, the Quakers held onto the lead heading into bars in their final rotation.

Junior Sara Kenefick led off the bars rotation with a 9.625 and her signature double-twisting flyaway dismount. Kristen Kuhn in the third spot notched a 9.85, the best of the rotation and second best of the meet. Even before McCaleigh Marr was set to go, the Quakers had locked up

The GEC held its first conference championships a year ago in 2022. Penn won last year with an all-time best of 196.950. A second win in a row further cements the team’s legacy as one of the best in the history of the program.

To make the win even sweeter, Penn took home a near-sweep of conference awards. Becker was named Coach of the Year, Casey Rohrbaugh and Cassie Hageman were named Assistant Coaches of the Year, Lassiter was named Newcomer of the Year, and Marr was named co-Specialist of the Year alongside Brown’s Julia Bedell.

Next year, Marr will use her final year of eligibility at Michigan as a graduate transfer.

Becker says the win feels “even sweeter” after

to pour in.

Quaker senior goalkeeper Kelly Van Hoesen played a huge role in keeping the game competitive — recording a season high 12 saves. Two of those were back-to-back saves late in of the second quarter in what proved to be a huge momentum changer as junior midfielder Maria Themelis would score on the subsequent possession to bring the Quakers within one. Themelis finished the game with a season-high four goals, most of which were the product of unassisted efforts.

the Ivy League missed parts of two seasons during the COVID-19 pandemic. “Last year, it felt as if we were reintroducing Penn gymnastics to the NCAA,” she said. “This year felt more of an overall focus on consistency, and I think we definitely accomplished that.”

For now, though, Becker is looking into the offseason as a preparation for the future. “The long-term goal,” she said, “is to qualify to NCAA postseason … we know this is something we are definitely capable of.”

Though the Quakers will not qualify for NCAA Regionals as a team this season, there are spots available for individual qualifiers, as Marr did last year for beam. Nominations for individual regional qualifiers were announced on March 20.

Despite the tough loss, during which the Quakers led two separate times, the Red and Blue still went blow for blow with a top-10 team for three whole quarters. While there are many aspects that can be improved on before the team’s next outing, especially when it comes to draw control, Penn’s energy throughout the game shows that it is unafraid of any opponent, no matter how star-studded its resume is.

“We went really hard and we played for four quarters,” said Corbett. “I’m really proud of how hard [the team] went to goal. They really drove hard, went through ground balls, and had a lot of competitive fight which I thought was great.”

Penn will be hungry to add a tally to the win column when it takes on Georgetown at Franklin Field this Sunday at 1 p.m.

Kai Eisenhardt of women’s track and field is always aiming higher

The sophomore pole vaulter is looking ahead to the rest of outdoor season after an injury ended last year’s campaign early

A big part of Penn women’s track and field’s Kai Eisenhardt’s routine at the beginning of every season is setting high goals and dreaming big.

As outdoor track and field season gets underway, the sophomore pole vaulter is excited to return to form at Franklin Field, pursue those big goals, and complete in a full indoor-outdoor season for the Quakers after an injury last winter cut her season short.

A specific goal Eisenhardt has in mind is to clear 13 feet, and the Montverde, Fla. native is keeping it simple with how to get there.

“I’m always going after that elusive 13-foot mark,” she said. “I know that I have a couple more PRs left in me this season, so that’s the goal too. We put in a lot of hours focusing on technique and conditioning. Just keeping up with that is the plan.”

In addition to achieving her goals, Eisenhardt is looking forward to big meets — like the Penn Relays — not just

because of the star athletes joining her on the field, but also since her family will be in the crowd.

“Even though I grew up in Florida, my family roots are in Philadelphia,” Eisenhardt expressed. “[My family] definitely comes out and supports me and the team. I remember on my recruiting trip with my coach, we were at Franklin Field, and I pointed to the stands and was like ‘my family will be right there.’ That’s an added bonus to this whole opportunity being here at Penn. Now, with [my immediate family] having moved to New Jersey, even more of my family members get to come and watch. It’s just awesome.”

Throughout her whole athletic career — which started in gymnastics before she began dabbling in pole vaulting — Eisenhardt’s greatest strength has always been reaching for the moon and dreaming big. Using affirmations and manifestation to aid in accomplishing those goals is what she thinks sets successful athletes apart.

Women’s lacrosse can’t keep up in 1612 defeat vs. No. 10 Maryland

The Terrapins pulled away with six unanswered goals in the fourth quarter

YAO

In the past 28 times that No. 10 Maryland faced off with No. 24 Penn women’s lacrosse, the Quakers came away victorious only two times. The last win came over a decade ago in a tight 9-7 contest at Franklin Field in 2007. For the first 45 minutes of the 29th match up between the two teams, Penn looked like it was en route to earning its third-ever win against the Terrapins. That hope lasted until Maryland went on a six-goal scoring tear early in the fourth quarter that would put the game beyond Penn’s reach. The Quakers would end up losing the game 16-12. Penn (4-3, 2-0 Ivy) would draw first blood, scoring early in the first quarter off of sophomore midfielder Anna Brandt’s effort. Brandt would prove to be a huge problem for Maryland (8-3) as she would finish the night with five goals — the most out of any player in the game. However, Maryland would respond each time Penn scored, keeping the game a close affair through three quarters.

Failing to control the draw consistently pained the Quakers throughout the game. Penn was only able to control nine draws compared to Maryland’s 23. Early on, a

fresh and incredibly disciplined Penn defense was able to force turnovers that minimized the damage of not winning draws. But as the game progressed and the defense became increasingly fatigued, the lack of draw controls proved to hurt.

“Our fundamentals on the draw as a team have to be better,” coach Karin Corbett said. “There were ones that were in our stick, and we would cough them up. [We] just can’t do that against a team like Maryland.”

Between this and excessive penalties, which gave Maryland nine total free-position shots, of which it converted five, Penn gave Maryland enough easy opportunities to regain control of the game.

“We wanted to change things up,” said Corbett. “We kept them guessing a little bit, we just had too many fouls.”

The Maryland attack becoming more efficient in the fourth quarter was the death knell for the Penn defense. It had taken the Terrapins the majority of the game to find any rhythm on attack, but when they did, the goals started

“Honestly, I truly believe that setting lofty goals for yourself, being willing to go for them, and believing that it is possible to reach these big goals is how anyone succeeds,” Eisenhardt said. “You sometimes have to take a step back sometimes and realize how honored and grateful we are to be able to compete and be a student here.”

It may be a seem like a basic idea, but it continues to fuel Eisenhardt’s successes in her pole vaulting career. Recently, she recorded a first-place finish at the 2023

Darius Dixon Memorial Invitational. A couple of weeks later at the Ivy League Heptagonal Indoor Track & Field Championships, she cleared 12’ 6.25” to set a personal best — inching her closer and closer to her 13-foot dreams.

“I think any athlete should know that dreaming big and working towards those goals really does work. That’s what I did, and it helped me get here. It’s what I’ll keep doing and hopefully, it’s what will help me eventually succeed in veterinarian school too.”

Springing forward

Checking in on Penn’s spring sports teams

Some of Penn’s teams are 20 games in, some have just gotten underway, others have yet to start. With performances ranging from dominating success to struggles, here’s how Penn’s spring sports teams have fared so far in 2023.

Men’s lacrosse

With strong wins mixed with bitter losses, men’s lacrosse (3-3, 1-0 Ivy) has delivered mixed results this season.

The team has split its first six games — yet it’s notable to mention every opponent the Quakers have gone up against was nationally ranked. The Quakers redeemed a two-goal loss to No. 8 Georgetown in last season’s opener by defeating the Hoyas 9-7 to open the 2023 season. However, the squad dropped its next two games to No. 10 Duke and No. 17 Penn State.

More recently, the Quakers picked up a pair of overtime victories to topple No. 17 St. Joe’s and No. 18 Princeton, proving that an injury to senior attacker Dylan Gergar’s — one of the team’s top scorers and the newest person to join the program’s 100-goal club — isn’t holding them back.

As Ivy League play ramps up, Penn’s ability to hold early leads will be as important as ever, especially as the team is preparing to face one its toughest opponents yet: No. 5 Cornell, which has scored double-digit goals in each of its wins this season.

Women’s lacrosse

After setting the tone for the season with a dominant 21-1 victory over La Salle to open its season, women’s lacrosse (4-3, 2-0 Ivy) has rolled into Ivy play with ease.

The Quakers have not shied away from the net, having scored 97 goals this season already. But after that win against La Salle, the Quakers’ defense has also faltered, averaging nearly 13 goals allowed in the last six games. Penn has also played a hard schedule, and it has mostly held up, mixing losses against No. 22 Jacksonville and

Anna Kalandadze places tenth at NCAA Championships

The senior swimmer earned secondteam All-American honors in the 1650yard freestyle

For senior Anna Kalandadze, a trip to Tennessee to compete in the NCAA Division I Women’s Swimming and Diving National Championships was well worth it, as the senior finished 10th nationally in the 1650-yard freestyle, good enough for second-team All-American honors.

It is a crowning achievement for Kalandadze, who has already earned Penn’s program record, the Ivy League record, and an Ivy League title during her time at Penn. In addition to the 1650 free, she also placed 25th in the 500-yard free, an event won by her former teammate Lia Thomas last year.

No. 8 Loyola Maryland with an overtime win on the road against No. 16 Johns Hopkins.

The Quakers have been getting wins where it matters, too, defeating Columbia and Harvard to remain atop the Ivy League standings. And in its most recent game, against No. 10 Maryland on Wednesday, Penn kept the game close for three quarters before giving up six unanswered goals in the fourth, allowing the Terrapins to pull away.

Men’s tennis

Ivy play is just over a week away for men’s tennis (5-7), but if recent struggles continue, the team’s chances of improving on last season’s near-perfect conference record are slim.

The Quakers have dropped their past three matches — all to nationally ranked teams — and are 2-6 dating back to the ECAC Championship in mid-February. All hope isn’t lost though, as many individual matches have been within narrow margins. Senior duo Edoardo Graziani and Kevin Zhu have been unstoppable for Penn in doubles, boasting an undefeated 6-0 record.

The team has been lights out at home, but has struggled to notch wins on the road. However, with five of its remaining nine matches being played at the Hamlin/ Hecht Tennis Centers, Penn has the potential to finish its season strong.

Women’s tennis

Opening its season with a strong 4-0 start, women’s tennis (9-4) has kept much of its momentum from an undefeated January alive as Ivy League play — commencing April 1 — looms around the corner.

The Quakers’ ability to jump out to swift leads has been key to their success. Many of their wins haven’t even been close, including back-to-back 7-0 sweeps of Philadelphia foes Villanova and Drexel in late February. Sophomore Sabine Rutlauka is undefeated in singles with a 10-0

Gymnastics wins second straight conference championship

The Quakers recorded an overall score of 194.925 at the GEC Championships last weekend

Penn gymnastics ended their record-breaking season with a win at the Gymnastics East Conference Championships Saturday.

Coach Kirsten Becker called the win “truly a testament to how hard everyone worked during the off time through [COVID-19].” Their score of 194.925 ties for the fifth best this season.

The Quakers began the evening on beam, where junior Kiersten Belkoff’s 9.7 continued her hot streak in the leadoff spot. Freshman standout Skyelar Kerico notched the highest score of the rotation and third-highest score of the meet with See SWIM, page 8 See GYM, page 8

record this spring.

Mirroring the men’s schedule, the women’s squad has five games at home left in the season — where the team has fared 7-0. The Quakers will welcome Fairleigh Dickinson on Saturday before kicking off conference play with a match against Princeton a week later.

Baseball The bats are alive for Penn baseball (9-7), which had to quickly adjust to the pitching and batting struggles it faced to start the season.

Senior catcher Jackson Appel has used his patience at the plate to draw eight walks and boasts a .395 on-base percentage. Senior first baseman Ben Miller leads the team in slugging at .603 and home runs with five. But it’s evident that the success of the veterans is rubbing off on the new faces on the roster.

Freshman infielders Davis Baker and Ryan Taylor have been staples in this year’s lineup so far. Baker is hitting .368 with 21 hits and Taylor has seven runs batted in and a .262 batting average. On the mound, Penn has been dominant too with no loss this season coming with a deficit larger than four runs.

A three-game series against Columbia in May is surely circled in every player’s calendar, but before the team can avenge last year’s Ivy League Tournament loss, it must deal with the rest of the conference — beginning with Harvard this weekend — first.

Softball

New coach, new problems.

Following longtime coach Leslie King’s retirement in January, wins have not been easy to come by for Penn softball (2-19, 0-3 Ivy) this season. Three Quakers have a batting average above .300, but their efforts aren’t enough as the team has been roundly defeated in most of its games. What’s more staggering though is the team’s struggles on the mound. The Quakers have a combined ERA above six and opponents are averaging .376 against them

— compared to Penn’s .263 batting average as a team.

Ivy League play began with a tough sweep by Harvard where the Quakers only mustered seven runs to the Crimson’s 27. Despite performance trends showing a slight upwards tick, with the team winning its first games of the season in a doubleheader against Maryland Eastern Shore on Wednesday, most of the squad’s remaining games are on the road, and travel has not been friendly to Quakers.

Men’s track and field

The indoor season for men’s track and field ended strong, with a fourth-place finish at Ivy League Heptagonals. Outdoor season kicked off even better.

The team picked up three first-place finishes and 12 more top-five finishes at the Penn Challenge last weekend. Freshman Andrew O’Donnell came in first with a time of 48.94 in the 400-meter dash and sophomore Liam O’Hara’s time of 53.55 also secured him a first-place finish in the 400-meter hurdles. Sophomore James Rhoads cleared 4.90m in the pole vault to win the event, continuing the success he achieved indoors.

A busy outdoor schedule is ahead of the Quakers, but if this weekend’s Raleigh Relays are anything like Penn Challenge, the Quakers can expect several top finishes. Women’s track and field

Coming off of a third-place finish in the Ivy League for the indoor season, the women’s track and field team returned a total of five first-place finishes at Penn Challenge.

The Quakers swept the podium in the 400m and weren’t slowed down by any hurdles, again taking the first three spots in the 400m hurdles. Freshman sprinter Moforehan Abinusawa’s stellar performance in the indoor season has carried over as she clocked a 24.33 time in the 200m for yet another first-place finish.

No program or personal bests were set last weekend, but the season is still young and the Quakers will have plenty more opportunities to shatter a couple of records.