EDITORIAL: Welcome to our neighborhood

The complete guide of tips, hints, tricks and shortcuts on University life for the class of 2001. The complete guide of tips, hints, tricks and shortcuts on University life for the class of 2001. You've finally made it. As you enjoy your last endless summer and prepare for college, we'd like to welcome you to the University of Pennsylvania. At Penn, you'll meet a diverse array of people involved in a wide range of activities -- whether they are your classmates, professors, graduate student teaching assistants or the people next door. The academic disciplines will cover a variety of subjects that you never imagined would be taught in a classroom. Once you arrive on Penn's campus, you are the one in charge, not Mom and Dad. You are responsible for yourself and no one else. You can choose whether to attend your Physics for Musicians class or catch up on the sleep you missed because you visited Murphy's Tavern. Four years at Penn will be a lesson in academics but also a lesson in life. You'll learn more about yourself from your hallmates than you will about Shakespeare, but that's what college is about. It's talking to 4 a.m. with your friends about everything and nothing although you have an Economics test at 10 a.m. the next morning. It's about joining the Ultimate Frisbee club because it's something you've never done before. The Penn experience is what will help determine who you will become. Admission to the Class of 2001 was extremely selective. Penn's standards and reputation, under University President Judith Rodin, are on the rise -- and you should be proud to play a part in this production winning world-wide acclaim. but this is also a time of great change at the University. Administrators have just released plans that will overhaul the entire residential living system. Most of the dormitories will receive much needed technological and structural renovations. Dorms will be reorganized into "residential colleges" which will group about 400 to 500 students together that would have additional faculty and graduate student residents and might be centered around themes of research or community service. But plans for these programs are still being developed and you might have a chance to put forth your opinions on what these "residential colleges" will be. Ground is being broken this summer on the new University bookstore to be run by Barnes & Noble. This is only the beginning of what will soon develop into Sansom Commons -- a mall-type area with several eating places and upscale retail. Your class will hopefully be one of the first to experience Sansom Commons. The Perelman Quadrangle student center project has been underway for the past year. This project will fund renovation and reconfiguration of four landmark campus buildings to provide study, meeting, eating and performance space. While Houston Hall and Irvine Auditorium will soon be under construction during your first year at Penn, we hope that your class will see this project completed by your senior year. Lastly, Quaker football and basketball teams are poised to challenge for the Ivy league titles this year. It will be an exciting year, in the classrooms and the laboratories, on the courts and the athletic fields. And you'll have a front-row seat. Browse through this special edition of The Daily Pennsylvanian and see what's left out of the campus tour. Once you arrive, join us to cover the University. Or help manage our independent corporation, with its $1 million annual budget. The least you can do is become an avid reader. We, the 113th Board of Editors and Managers, encourage you to enjoy the rest of your summer and store up some sleep for those all-nighters that lie ahead. See you in September!