U. to hold town hall next month

Fagin, Lazerson to host In what will be their television debut, Interim President Claire Fagin and Interim Provost Marvin Lazerson will host a live University town meeting on October 4. The program, which will be broadcast live at 1 p.m. from the Annenberg School on the campus ResNet system, is the first of its kind to be held on a college campus, the University said. The town meeting will held before a studio audience of four representatives from the Commission on Strengthening the Community and 25 undergraduate, graduate and professional students picked by key student groups. "We are counting on the town meeting as one forum among many to get ideas and possibilities for our future," said Gloria Chisum, chairperson of the Commission and vice chairperson of the University's Board of Trustees. Fagin said the town meeting has been in the works since July, and was designed to provide an opportunity for the campus to discuss the University's strengths and weaknesses. She added she hopes to focus on solutions, rather than on problems. "We hear a lot lately about Penn's problems, and we have our share like any community – but our strengths are important too, and our greatest strength is, of course, our people," Fagin said. "The town meeting is a way to bring some of us together so we can work out our future, not belabor our past." Since it is an experiment in new technology, the town meeting's format will be kept fairly simple, which means no live callers will be taken on the air. Viewing rooms across campus will be provided for those students who do not have access to ResNet. The town meeting will also be re-run again at different times during the day for those in class at 1 p.m. The town meeting is produced and broadcast entirely by student, staff and faculty volunteers from across the University. "We had no trouble finding the talent and expertise to produce this event," Lazerson said. "There were people all over campus with interest and energy. We are grateful to them for volunteering and absolutely delighted to find such talent in our own backyard." If the town meeting proves successful, Fagin said, she hopes to have many more, with even more members of the University community involved.