Penn is gearing up for a season of tough congressional lobbying after planting its flag in D.C. this past summer.
The University relocated its Office of Federal Affairs from Penn to Washington in July. The presence in Washington, officials say, will give Penn a leg up as it fights to preserve federal funding for scientific research and financial aid.
Bill Andresen, who leads the D.C. office, said that since the move this summer, he has been spending his time setting up the office and getting familiar with people both at Penn and on Capitol Hill.
Andresen has been meeting with deans at Penn as well as with officials on the Hill, such as representatives from the Department of Education. His goal, he said, is to make Penn's presence known.
He added that he has been trying to find people to fill the office, and that it will ultimately have a three-person staff.
"The main goal of this office is to raise Penn's profile in Washington, D.C.," he said.
Setting up camp in Washington was an important move for Penn, Vice President of Government and Community Relations Vanda McMurtry said.
"Penn was relying on its location fairly close to D.C. with good Amtrak service and did that for a number of years," McMurtry said. "But now we've gotten to the point where the issues that affect us in Washington have really loomed large."
And higher-education officials agree that the legal concerns and funding constraints universities now face have been growing.
Major issues include advocating for federal funding for scientific research and governmental grants for financial aid, according to Association of American Universities spokesman Barry Toiv.
Many universities are also fighting for the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act, the law that regulates the funding for all federal higher-education programs. It has not been reauthorized since 1998.
"The issues for higher education and particularly for research universities are continually more important and complex," Toiv said. "That is why more and more of our universities have opened Washington offices."
Associate Director of the American Council of Education Bill Parsons, who specializes in legislative issues affecting universities, agreed that increasing federal funding for biomedical and physical-science research and financial aid was a major priority for his organization.
In February, the government cut $39 billion out of federal spending, one third of which came out funds previously devoted to higher education, he said.
"We would like to see some of that money - if not all of it - restored," he added.
And Penn certainly plans to partake in these debates, University President Amy Gutmann said.
The office is designed to give the University a stronger voice on national issues and to allow it to partake in governmental debates, she said.
Dealing with such issues is "going to create some challenges for us and create some opportunities for us," McMurtry said. "We will be able to handle those challenges and exploit those opportunities much, much better because we have the Washington office."
Gutmann said relocating the office was both her and McMurtry's idea.
"The big universities do it," she said. "It was surprising, frankly, that we didn't."
McMurtry said much of Penn's work in D.C. has yet to unfold.
"There's this very large realm of opportunity that we really haven't explored," he said.
