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(12/08/00 10:00am)
Life has a nice way of periodically delivering a healthy kick to the rear, doesn't it?
Take, for instance, finals season. We all knew this was coming for the past three months, but each successive week this semester has slowly added to a downward spiral of denial.
Well, deny it all you want, but with only a weekend and some reading days left before the fun starts, the campus is slowly taking on the more redeeming characteristics of a morgue.
Look to your left, and behold the sleep-deprived Finance student dragging a cot into Steinberg-Dietrich for the first in a series of all-nighters. Look to your right, and witness the zombie in Rosengarten frantically searching for words like "superfluous" and "extraneous" to creep over that eight-page minimum threshold.
And with these scenarios come the snappy, biting attitude that lies dormant for most of the semester, hidden under a layer of ample sleep and a balanced amount of work.
They don't show you this in the admissions guide, do they?
The University of Pennsylvania is a great school for working hard and playing hard -- but come the last two weeks before winter break, and suddenly reality deals a cruel blow and knocks the entire balance out of whack.
While the mix of fun and work turns to a lethal dose of untarnished toil in your personal hell, everyone else on campus is going through the same exact thing. And for that reason, there's little excuse for pretending your load is the heaviest and the world should just move aside in deference.
You know what I mean. The snappy comments by hurried people standing in line multiplies tenfold. The pace of passersby on Locust Walk cranks up a notch from a lazy meander to a determined stride.
All over campus, you can feel everyone operating with that little hint of panic and desperation.
Don't just suck it up, either. Rather than denying the horrible situation your poor planning has wrought, try incorporating some fun into the next few weeks.
Contrary to popular belief, there are constructive alternatives to hating the entire world for the enormous workload suddenly materializing on your desk.
And by constructive alternatives, I don't mean the famous pastime of comparing how much you have to do in the next four days with your roommate to determine who's in a deeper hole. Because we all know that confirming your superlatively crappy situation really makes it easier to swallow.
Go to a basketball game. With a nationally ranked Maryland team in town tomorrow, there's no better way to take the edge off than screaming your lungs out at opposing Terrapins .
Who knows, with a win possible at the Palestra, you might just pick up that contagious slay-the-beast attitude for your upcoming tests.
Check out some of the shows still getting crammed in by one of Penn's thousands of performing groups. There are a few still remaining and they've had more time to practice than the others -- whether that means they'll be any good only you can decide.
Go work out -- your atrophied toothpick legs won't help you get around if you don't show them some more love than the "e-mail break" to the iMacs in the library.
In the end, there's no denying that fall semester is rough. The days are getting shorter, the nights longer -- and staying up late when an inviting bed calls to you takes its toll.
With a long break ahead, staying focused for a few tests or papers in the next few weeks never is easy.
But maybe some of you can become the two percent who don't become clinically insane over the next week. Some might realize that while hating the world and carrying that heavy chip on their shoulder can be entertaining for a day, but it's not so much fun when everyone else is slouching, too.
Or just keep on working yourself crazy. Some might think a few weeks of pain isn't that bad when a month of nirvana lies right over the cliff's edge. And for those appreciating the psychotic anguish of finals, enjoy.
Either way, you can find me working diligently on a true New Year's priority -- delivering a swift kick right back at life.
(12/01/00 10:00am)
Few things in this world are more calming to a frayed set of nerves than a trip to the art museum. Your looming Finance test and History paper are for a fleeting moment forgotten once you step into an exhibit and find a piece that honestly fascinates you.
And when the Van Gogh: Face to Face exhibit arrived at the Philadelphia Museum of Art recently, I knew it had the potential to be one of those beautiful moments of escape -- escape from the assignments, deadlines and daily grind of Penn life.
Last weekend, I finally found the opportunity to make the trip. Armed with an equally eager friend and my pretentious art-gazing uniform of corduroy pants and a black turtleneck, I set out for a nice Saturday excursion.
After avoiding what could have been an excruciating wait in line (by getting there 15 minutes late), I giddily bounced into the first room. That Van Gogh, he certainly was a genius -- from his first black-and-white works of pensioners living in The Hague to his vibrant paintings of children in Auvers, Van Gogh, my headphone-provided commentary told me, was superb in conveying the human condition through art.
So fascinating was the exhibit that I was convinced others were enjoying it as much as I was, if not more so. Never having formally studied art, surely I -- the most neanderthal of the patrons at the museum that day -- was not getting half as much out of it as the others.
But then why was everyone moving so quickly? How could they brush past the collection of self-portraits painted in 1887 and "The Postman" in such a hurried fashion? Was the Mona Lisa waiting at the end of the exhibit? What was this draw that pulled these people through the $20-per-person exhibit in a blistering 10 minutes?
Two words: gift shop.
Obviously, getting one's hands on the oh-so-cute blue and green baseball with a Van Gogh quote on the side was more important than the original art by the same man. Or maybe it wasn't the baseball; it was the colored fortune cookies with Van Gogh's sayings inside or the Roulin family finger puppets. Probably not; it was certainly the silk "Sunflowers" scarves or the to-scale replica furniture of Van Gogh's room -- the plain wooden bed, big enough for an 8-year-old, sells for $10,000, I think.
All told, I spent about an hour in the exhibit and an equal amount of time in the adjacent gift shop, simply because the crowd in the latter was simply impenetrable. I could only stay at the entrance and hope that the flow of traffic pushed me in the general direction of the exit.
In the process of being moved gently -- this was a museum, after all -- I had the opportunity to eavesdrop on the conversations of the gift-buying masses. From the complete lack of discussion over the work in the previous rooms, I could only infer a complete lack of interest in the art itself compared to the overwhelming need to find proof of having passed through the exhibit.
And the more kitschy the idea (see Van Gogh fortune cookies), the better.
In the end, it isn't the inexplicable way an artist can show you a person's life in one picture or the impressionist influences in Paris that irrevocably altered Van Gogh's work that will continue to draw record-breaking crowds into the PMA until January 14. It's the presence of an event, regardless of content, that pulls status-seekers from across the Eastern Seaboard to Philadelphia.
Whether it's the Republican National Convention, the Millennium Celebration or this new Van Gogh exhibit, it never really happened -- we were never really there -- until we have a souvenir to give our friends or plaster on our wall as proof.
It's not the experience that we live for anymore. It's the prestige that comes with having been there, wherever there happens to be today, this weekend, next month. And while Van Gogh's honest look at impoverished peasants and pensioners was sobering, that was the saddest reflection on the human condition I witnessed that day.
(11/17/00 10:00am)
Where have our gentle, guiding elders gone? Moreover, who can possibly replace the vacuum of leadership created with last week's stunning news?
That's right -- for those of you in a recount-induced coma, Fred Rogers announced the final new episodes of his children's television show, Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood, will be taped next year.
That's right. Mr. Rogers, 71, is taking his message to greener pastures.
I sense that most will quickly shrug off this news, assuming Mr. Rogers is just another program soon to be forgotten. But let the record show that when Mr. Rogers goes off the air, it's not just another show signing off; it's a sign of the times.
There's just no more room for the Mr. Rogerses in today's world, is there?
Instead of the poised comfort of a man clad in a cardigan expounding the wonders of sharing, anger management and the need to address your fear of the dark head on, we are left with Japanese anime and the Power Rangers.
Granted, most of you left children's television behind some 15 years ago, but for all who still find comfort in consistency, Mr. Rogers was a rock, and a pleasant one at that.
Mr. Rogers never was the cool show to watch or even something you would talk about with your preschool friends over cookies and milk. And from talking with my 5-year-old nephew Benji, this has stayed constant. But everyone watched Mr. Rogers, and for that, no one can claim to have been made a lesser person.
Today's shows targeted at children often come with the focus on selling a myriad of spin-off products. Take the evil to end all evil -- Pokemon -- or the more benign examples of commercialized education, like Blue's Clues.
Mr. Rogers? Did he ever try to sell you anything other than the good feeling that comes along with being a good person?
Instead, he was a sign that with all that's wrong with television raising our kids, at least there's something mildly right. Over his 50 years in television, the last 33 spent with his eponymous neighborhood show, Fred Rogers had the sole intention of making this crazy world a more calming one for children. And if you still think monetary motives drove his actions, might I remind you that public television is where profits go to die.
In fact, as the longest-running children's show on public television, Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood likely had its opportunities to strike it rich on other media outlets. But how can you preach the value of self-esteem when the value of the advertising revenues paying your bills is the primary concern?
Maybe some will see this as a weak manifesto for public television. But I'm not all that passionate about stations whose "prime time" programming consists of repeats of the Three Tenors.
I do think, however, that the sooner we realize how much we were influenced by television when we were growing up, the quicker we can determine that some programs do more than keep our kids preoccupied.
Some shows are more innocuous than others and offer educational value in exchange for selling toys, but the fading away of a man who embodies all that can be good about children's television is something that can't be ignored.
So while we've likely forgotten King Friday XIII, Daniel Striped Tiger and Lady Elaine Fairchilde, we won't forget that honest humanitarians like Mr. Rogers do exist and have made an impact. And with any luck, someone watching his show today just might follow his sneaker-wearing footsteps.
And that person might learn a lesson which the entire country should today take to heart -- that playing fair and treating your opponents with respect are more important than winning at any cost.
Even my nephew Benji could tell you that Mr. Rogers wouldn't be pleased.
(11/10/00 10:00am)
As yesterday's recount in Florida took a tiny step toward settling the issue over who will be the 43rd president of the United States, many pundits heralded the incredible value of each vote.
And while that may be true for senior citizens in Palm Beach with five all-news channels asking how confused you were by the ballot, it doesn't go very far in explaining the value of a vote for Bush in Massachusetts, where a winner-takes-all Electoral College stifles your voice.
But regardless of volume, an American's voice at the voting booth is of superlative importance; our system depends on an honest, efficient and fair gauge of the people's choice.
When I changed my voter registration to my college address, I did so in order to make my voice heard immediately on Election Day (as well as postpone what ended up being a gut decision from a menu of disheartening choices). I'll probably reconsider that choice in the future as a result of the gross display of incompetence I viewed in DRL Tuesday afternoon.
I arrived at 1:30 p.m. and cast my vote 90 minutes later. After waiting in a laughably long line because I left my voter registration card at home -- an unnecessary document, the authorities say -- I reached the democracy's first line of defense: Table 1.
Table 1's role was to take all the ignoramuses who didn't bring their registration cards and tell them where to go based on their street address. When I gave my address, the worker there looked at the book and then back toward me like I was crazy. That's understandable -- after all, I'm sure not many people voting that day were coming from the Quad. She huffed and puffed and sent me over to Table 2.
Table 2 was even better. The staffer there was busy trying to get help from the woman at Table 1 on how to do her job, while the woman at Table 1 was busy sending people over to her. Circular logic to say the least, but common sense that afternoon.
As I made my way down the tables to see which book, if any, listed my name, my good luck kicked in -- I found my name at the last table in the hallway. At no point, however, did any polling attendant show any concern for the hundreds of other frustrated students.
With our civic duty in mind, we waited for help that rarely came.
The student next to me in line went so far as to go to a city court to get his vote counted on an absentee ballot -- all because his name was missing from the list at DRL. If we as college students are expected to cut an entire day of classes to perform our civic duty, the least our retired compatriots in Palm Beach can do is follow an arrow to a hole.
Tuesday was a sad day for a person interested in increasing voter turnout -- the barriers to voting are still ridiculously high when they should be outrageously low. In retrospect, I'm convinced the officials were unaware of the importance of their position -- their ambivalence to whether or not I voted, just as long as I kept my mouth shut in line, was shocking under the circumstances.
This summer, a census official pounded my parents' door to get a "long form" filled out. From his persistence in July, it's clear the government can hire competent help when it values a task. Why this same sense of duty could not be found at my polling station sends a different message.
Regardless of your views on this past (and current) election -- and whether you notice that based on the county's mortality rate, 2,000 voters in Palm Beach won't live to see the next president inaugurated but will decide who wins -- the fact remains that voting should be a smoother process. This is especially true for younger voters, who are just getting accustomed to voting.
I know that in the future, when I pass by students voting at DRL, their experience will be a bit smoother. I'll be doing my part to lighten the workers' load.
I'll be voting absentee.
(11/03/00 10:00am)
Obviously, the important event of the next few days is the selection of the next president of the United States. And among the debates over abortion, Social Security and the irresponsible spending both candidates advocate rather than paying off the national debt lies a central concern for most Americans: education.
While we concern ourselves with the quality of instruction in the classroom, few of us ever consider the amount of learning and growth that occurs off school grounds. From 7:45 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., most kids are confined in the boundaries of a school, but what happens when the closing bell rings?
The U.S. Census Bureau released statistics on Tuesday that might surprise those who assume every child is coming home to June Cleaver and setting the table while waiting for Ward to come home. Those statistics? More than two million children under the age of 12 are left home alone before or after school. Furthermore, the seven million 5-to-14-year-olds of working parents are left home alone for an average of six hours per week.
Ah, yes, the plight of latchkey kids. What seems like an atrocity developing from dual-income households is nothing of the sort. As an alumnus of the latchkey society, I ask that the rest of the world -- U.S. Census Bureau and media reporting this "scare" included -- to just take a breather.
As long as I can remember, I was coming home to an empty house or one with only my older sister present. Both parents were out at work until 5:00. Did I discover the wonders of juvenile delinquency in the absence of parental supervision? To the contrary -- I believe the lessons I learned were anything but deviant.
Coming home to an empty house doesn't mean you sit on the couch and cry about the fact that you already counted all the dimples in the ceiling tiles last month. It means you get up off your keister and make your hungry tummy something to eat and start to do your homework.
(Granted, I did most of that work in front of the television -- 3-2-1 Contact simply cannot be denied.)
Why polish off that homework before your parents get home? So you don't have to do it while they're there -- absence likely makes the heart grow fonder, but it also makes for an efficient worker who knows the value of family time.
Coming home to an empty house doesn't mean you learn to fool around and act irresponsibly. What you do learn -- and rather quickly -- is how cold it gets in the winter when you forget your keys and you're locked out of the house until Mom or Dad gets home. In short, you learn responsibility in the most vivid of ways; if you don't, you usually end up with frostbitten toes.
Coming home to an empty house doesn't mean you learn that "family" is a four-letter word. You learn that your parents love you in a superlative way -- to the extent that they will give up that which they cherish most (time spent with their children) so that you can be afforded the financial freedoms of possibly attending an Ivy League school.
Not all latchkey kids end up in Ivy League institutions. Not all of them become bastions of responsible behavior. Not all of them do their homework in a timely manner, although all of them do learn the art of subsistence cooking.
So please, don't pity me for not having adult supervision for 10 hours a week while I was an impressionable youth. I don't claim to have had the ideal childhood, but that's because I think no one has ever had an ideal childhood. And I don't think anyone else has the right to preach their lifestyle choices to others who have different constraints on their time and finances. What I had worked for me -- and it worked pretty damn well.
So let's keep our eyes on improving the time our kids spend in school and leave the parental choices to those best qualified to make them: the parents themselves.
(10/27/00 9:00am)
I, like most of my peers, love my family. The people who have seen you in your diapers always hold a special place in your heart, and the dirt they have on you is so embarrassing that you would be a fool to let these people become enemies.
Since I love my family, I have done them the favor of never inviting them down for the annual tradition of Family Weekend. Beginning today, however, hundreds of family members, particularly of freshmen, will have mistakenly accepted an invitation to visit campus.
These families, for a variety of reasons -- access to the Penn calendar and an inability to take no for an answer -- have stepped into a nightmare like no other. To these visitors, an open letter addressing the things you might witness this weekend:
€ Your child, regardless of what he or she insists, is not getting an adequate amount of sleep. In fact, I can assure you that he or she consistently goes to sleep at 4:45 a.m. and wakes up 30 minutes late for class -- if at all.
€ You are paying approximately $125 for your child to sleep in a lecture room during an average 90-minute class. An Ivy League education is money well spent, indeed.
€ Your budding scholar is not burning the midnight oil studying for said sleep-worthy classes. He is, however, discussing the meaning of life or the party last weekend with his hallmates or housemates. If your child is a Philosophy major or professional party planner, rejoice.
€ Since your Ivy League offspring has fallen behind in his work as a result of the above points, be aware that he will spontaneously combust at some point during the course of the weekend. Rest assured that this is occurring in each family.
€ Take your child out to dinner often -- any chance to exercise dormant taste buds will be greatly appreciated. As long as your student is stuffing his face with surf and turf, you will be revered as a god.
Welcome to Family Weekend, a cruel joke planned by the University to bring families in to see the monsters their children have become. Johnny and Mary have discovered a world without responsibility and will guard their new status quo.
Johnny's grown dreadlocks and Mary's suddenly acquired a taste for tube tops and tight black pants. Johnny spent last week learning about fraternity life, and Mary -- well, Mary's learned a lot about that already.
You parents, while still loved by your child, are an anachronism in this world. You are an authority figure in a land devoid of such gatekeepers. Respect this relationship and it may be a peaceful experience; pretend that this is home and invite a world of unnecessary conflict.
And to the freshmen, understand that you have likely changed more than you'd like to admit. Further recognize that your family has little knowledge of this Jekyll-Hyde transformation, and try to keep the party animal under wraps. You will be prodded this weekend to snap and run away; keep your composure and the rewards (see: surf and turf dinner above) will be handsomely bestowed.
Because of this, Family Weekend is a time of closely calculated behavior on the part of the student body. Balancing the act of pretending to be the child your parents think you are and the cool person you pretend to be around your friends is daunting to say the least.
For those who claim to be the same person to both groups, please -- everyone's a split personality at school. The sooner you accept it, the better you'll be able to juggle both roles.
With midterms flanking both ends of Family Weekend, most students are likely worried about tests and papers they may have handed in or need to complete. But for those whose families come by to visit, a much bigger test starts today.
Can you have a functional relationship with your families in the context of a college setting? Can your families learn to accept that a huge change has occurred in the vacuum of their influence, likely for the first time?
Pass these tests and enter a new, rewarding relationship with your family. Fail them and proceed to head directly to jail, do not pass Go and do not collect $200.
For those who fail, a make-up exam is just around the corner -- Thanksgiving break.
(10/20/00 9:00am)
Tomorrow, the difference between a man and a boy will be a number on their wrists. Tomorrow, the Pretenders will wake up early after a night of partying and start to watch cartoons while the Warriors trek to their place in...
The Line.
The Line is capitalized because it is longer than a simple queue for a bank teller on a Saturday afternoon and congregates those with more hunger and passion than your average lunchtime crowd at Le Petite Creperie.
Saturday will yet again mark the start of an annual event like no other at Penn -- the wait for prime season tickets for men's basketball. The reward for these loyal fans is unparalleled.
For them, a seat in or near the front row in the Mecca of college basketball awaits. For them, the benefits include being the first to storm the court after winning a third consecutive Ivy League championship and a berth to the Big Dance.
Penn basketball at the Palestra is more than an immensely gratifying form of entertainment; it is the gathering of past, present and future in the same building -- it is a living, breathing embodiment of Penn tradition.
If Ben Franklin were alive today, he would give it all up -- all of it -- to have center court seats, student section, front row. And once he had those seats for the season, he wouldn't use them -- he would be standing for the entire game.
Beating our Ivy brethren by upward of 40 points is more than another athletic competition at Penn -- it is an all-too-rare assertion of our dominance in a group of schools we too often envision as our superiors. In the Palestra, the U.S. News darlings of Harvard, Yale and Princeton are nothing but minor speed bumps on our way to the championship.
Those in the student section know that nothing can replicate the feeling of pummeling our smarmy neighbors from Jersey in a game that they take equally as seriously and fight equally as hard to win.
Alas, the sour taste of disappointment will be all the Tigers get this year.
But I shouldn't need to sell this season on promises of an Ivy title, a Princeton bludgeoning or a national upset or two along the way -- the experience speaks for itself.
Regardless of the team's win-loss record, games at the Palestra are an integral part of a complete Penn experience. You have your Econ Scream, your Hey Day, your toast-throwing and, above all, you have your throat-hoarse-from-screaming pain after a Quakers basketball game.
The warriors this weekend at Hutchinson Gymnasium know this already. They've been waiting all offseason after a painful loss to Illinois in the NCAAs. Their only solace was that next year is always around the corner.
And next year, my friends, starts tomorrow. Get out your blue and red face paint, work on your signs for the December 7 home opener against La Salle and exercise your knees for standing at attention for extended periods of time.
If you were lucky enough to get a low-numbered wristband and are planning to spend the weekend down at Hutch with images of crying Princeton fans dancing through your head, good for you. If you didn't, it's not too late to get a group together and participate in the fun starting tomorrow at 11:00 a.m.
And if that doesn't appeal to you, the least you can do is trek down to the ticket office early Monday morning -- tickets go on sale for non-Line participants at 11:00 -- and get yourself a season ticket.
You may miss out on the fun in the Line, but you'll participate in a spectacle like no other at this university.
Meanwhile, I'll be getting my sleeping bag and food rations together for two uncomfortable nights of sleep -- but it'll be worth it in a few weeks when the season starts.
That's when the quality of a four-year tenure at Penn isn't a matter of ranking in a magazine. It's a matter of spirit you taste, smell and feel in the Palestra -- a spirit that no endowment, no student-faculty ratio, no SAT score can ever replace. It's a matter of passion, and it's something you'll start to see this weekend at The Line.
(10/06/00 9:00am)
S asha celebrated his 20th birthday on July 12. When he's not busy studying for his Linguistics degree, he's either playing cards with the guys or going out with his girlfriend -- dinner and a movie or maybe just clubbing. As a part-time job, he's a bartender where the tips are good.<P>
In a lot of ways, Sasha is like many of us: hard at work, hard at play and trying to find a nice balance. But I wouldn't be telling you his story if there weren't a key difference that sets him apart.<P>
When Sasha passes by beggars in the street, he can't just turn the other way, but tossing some change won't clear his conscience. Unlike the rest of us, there is no guarantee that wherever he goes or whatever he does, everything will work out.<P>
He knows this because he's witnessed millions of cases where it never does.<P>
He knows this because he doesn't attend Penn, Penn State or even the Indiana University of Pennsylvania.<P>
He knows this because he lives in the Russian city of Perm and goes to the university there. And because of this simple distinguishing factor of location, Sasha's entire outlook on his future is vastly different from ours.<P>
Russia is a country in serious trouble that runs deeper than sunken submarines. But as it lacks the glamour of tax plans and Medicare, its news rarely reaches our ears.<P>
Here are a few figures to chew on:<P>
Russia recently has undergone an unprecedented decrease in population for an industrialized country -- from 148 million three years ago to 145 million today. While we debate the pros and cons of RU486, Russia has the world's highest abortion rate -- two out of every three pregnancies end this way.<P>
Russian men have Europe's highest mortality rate, with a life expectancy less than 60 years. Two out of every three working-age men who die do so from alcohol-related causes. Russian men are four times as likely as American men to commit suicide.<P>
Most startling -- and most revealing -- 40 percent of Russians live below the poverty line. Teachers in the United States may be underpaid, but they do not make $40 a month like their Russian counterparts.<P>
We here at Penn operate on a nice, comfortable assumption that regardless of career choice, be it Internet start-up or nonprofit organization, we will make ends meet. While we fret at info sessions or career fairs that we may end up making -- perish the thought -- under $30,000 in our first year, we know that life will be just fine. By virtue of our degree alone, our odds of winning the lottery are better than ever going hungry or homeless.<P>
Given a choice, Sasha would like to follow his passion and work in linguistics. Making that choice, however, resigns him to a life of abject poverty. If he wants to afford the simply luxury of buying his girlfriend flowers, he must continue to work wherever he can find it -- currently, behind a bar.<P>
Our peers across the globe are living in a different world. For them, the choices are not between Cancun and Jamaica for spring break. They may never even take a plane ride in their entire life, while most of us simply hop on the Internet to get a ticket home for Thanksgiving.<P>
Maybe these are just minor quibbles and obvious differences as a result of my being from the wealthiest country in the world. On the other hand, it's pretty amazing to stop and think about how much better off we are -- not because we're smarter, not because we work harder, not because we deserve it. Just because we live in the United States.<P>
That others aren't as lucky doesn't mean we owe it to follow a Mother Theresa life. It does mean we owe it to our peers to recognize the advantages we have and not waste them. Because at the end of the day, every child still deserves a future -- sadly enough, few in Sasha's country actually have one.<P>
Be grateful for the endless opportunities and comforts that lay ahead of you regardless of what you choose, whether that be investment banker or janitor. For every one of you, there are 50 Sashas who would give it all up in a heartbeat just to have a chance.<P>
This is the message he asked me to send.<P>
(10/03/00 9:00am)
In Steinberg-Dietrich Hall, College students are prevented from using Wharton computer labs. But even for a large number of Wharton students, certain doors remain closed within their own school.
Established in 1988, the Joseph Wharton Scholars program "is designed to emphasize the importance of scholarly research and the liberal arts within the framework of a business education," according to its World Wide Web site.
I happen to think that is a noble goal. Too many of my Wharton peers bulk up on Finance classes only to neglect the fantastic opportunities in the College. Subjects like History, English and Psychology are used to meet requirements; in-depth exploration of the liberal arts sadly exists more in brochures for the Wharton School than in the student body.
But distinct from the high ideals of the JWS program is its current execution. The Wharton School doesn't gauge interest in research or the liberal arts on its application specifically, but officials see fit to hand-pick incoming freshmen prior to matriculation from an unknown set of criteria.
For practical purposes, the program resembles a registration facilitator, similar to that of Benjamin Franklin Scholars or University Scholars. JWSers are granted special access to honors classes during pre-registration while other students must wait for drop-add and request departmental or instructor permission.
Evidenced by their own Web site, participants in JWS further envision themselves as superior to the general student body. For them, the program offers "expanded opportunities for high-potential, motivated Wharton students to interact with among the most talented of their class in both academic and social environments."
Under what criteria have these students proven themselves to have a higher potential or more motivation than the average Wharton student? Most students at Penn are extremely motivated and have enormous potential; do the members of the JWS Society honestly believe they are significantly better?
If so, the natural reaction is to apply to join this "elite" group. After all, what better proof of one's potential and motivation than his or her performance at Penn? The Benjamin Franklin Scholars program goes so far as to comment, "Because there are others who would be valuable members of the program, we strongly encourage other intellectually ambitious students to apply from on campus."
But unlike BFS, which allows students to apply in their first two years, JWSers are admitted only upon matriculation; there is no application process for those who sincerely exhibit an interest in research and the liberal arts within a business framework.
When I met with Martin Asher, the director of the Joseph Wharton Scholars program, he assured me his focus is on making the program represent something "different, not better." Over the summer, the JWS section of Econ 001 was replaced by a special experimental class, Finance 103x, which looks to cover more material with an emphasis on the program's ideals.
It is good to know JWS is being changed and refocused; it is crucial to harness this momentum for more substantive change.
First, any class that exhibits preference for JWS students over that of the general student body must exhibit a strong focus on research and/or the liberal arts. Classes that simply parallel non-honors offerings -- with the exception of offering blue-chip professors and smaller class sizes -- only reinforce a "better, not different" stigma.
Furthermore, students admitted into the program should express a specific interest in research and the liberal arts "within the framework of a business education." They should likewise be presented with a curriculum that reflects these interests by requiring a greater proportion of classes in the College than the average Wharton student.
But most students do not yearn for a research or liberal arts augmentation of their business curriculum until they've studied for quite a time at Penn. In that vein, if JWS wants to recognize students with this specific interest, on-campus applications and admittance is vital for any sense of legitimacy.
Ultimately, the program is in need of continued reform. Too many Wharton students see JWS as a bogus recognition allowing easy access to the best professors and courses.
As it stands, the program has little to counter these views.
To debunk these widely held beliefs, JWS needs a serious overhaul -- it has to become either a replica of BFS in Wharton or a program that lives up to its high ideals. I have faith the powers that be will refute the former, for the latter has something of value to offer the student body and should be pursued -- but only in an equitable way.
(09/22/00 9:00am)
Indulge me in a quick game of word association. I say University of Pennsylvania elder statesman and you think Benjamin Franklin, right?
Call me old-fashioned, but when I envision the values of learning "every thing that is useful and every thing that is ornamental," I use that pudgy character lounging in bronze by the Compass as a reference point. I like what Benjamin Franklin stands for: a renaissance man who left the world a better place than he found it.
His legacy remains in every library, fire department and hundred-dollar bill.
Fast forward to last weekend, when we were so subtly informed "There's No Place Like Penn... at Perelman Quadrangle." It seems to me that there are more and more places at Penn named in the fashion of the Perelman Quadrangle, and the only thing we risk in the process is our reputation and integrity by selling our campus bit-by-bit to the highest bidder.
At the ribbon-cutting ceremony on Saturday, Provost Barchi observed, "I think in the years to come, the words on everybody's lips will be OMeet me on Wynn Commons.'" But before we heartily embrace the name that millions of dollars thrust upon us, shall we first take a look at the honorable Mr. Wynn?
Steve Wynn is a very wealthy man by virtue of his many successful dealings in Las Vegas. Wynn first purchased a tract of unused land near Caesar's Palace that Caesar's ultimately bought for fear of increased competition. Wynn used his new capital to control another casino, the Golden Nugget. From there, Wynn revitalized a fading Vegas with a spectacular Mirage and today continues to up the ante with the $1.8 billion Bellagio.
Ronald Perelman, the other name on "everybody's lips" in the near future, is also a questionable character. Mr. Perelman, whose recent donations have targeted Penn, Princeton University and UCLA, started to accumulate his wealth in the early 1980s as America's most feared corporate raider.
His landmark business achievement was a 1985 takeover of Revlon -- the first successful hostile, junk-bond-financed takeover of a significant U.S. business.
Not exactly a string of terms our founder would have been eager to plaster around this campus.
But let's take a closer look -- both of these illustrious Penn alumni (Wynn from the College and Perelman from Wharton) turned Trustees have a connection with another alumnus of a more dubious nature. I refer to, of course, the homegrown Wharton MBA turned junk-bond -- dare I say it -- king, Michael Milken.
Milken's story is a long and complicated one -- the highlights include being the media's image of '80s greed and excess -- which ends in a lengthy prison sentence for securities fraud in 1990. Milken is hardly the image of integrity and ethics, but he is responsible for unleashing a young and ambitious corporate raider by the name of Perelman and funding a rising Vegas star in the late 1970s by the name of Wynn.
Oh, the tangled web Penn weaves.
What this long and rambling history lesson denotes is a hostile junk-bond-financed takeover of our University. These 1980s billionaires looking to clean up their images with ego-stroking donations and various Ivy League school associations are far from the standards of real philanthropy.
Real philanthropy does not carry a clause requiring the donor's name engraved in two-foot-tall letters beneath the University shield in a prominent campus location. Real philanthropy does not require an entire section of campus renamed to reflect the sugar daddy.
What real philanthropy does is allow the University to honor the name of any previous Penn alumnus, preferably deceased, who has contributed significantly to enhancing the stature and honor of the school through their lives.
If Ronald Perelman, Steve Wynn, Michael Milken and Donald Trump -- another '80s tycoon with a Wharton degree who has yet to bestow a portion of his wealth on the University -- reach these noble heights in their lives, then Penn should by all means honor them with a building or a concrete "yard."
Today, however, their legacies are far from positive in the eyes of any discriminating student. If that changes, I'd be happy to meet my fellow alumni at Milken Labs or Trump Hall in 2052.
Until then, I'd rather rendezvous with my peers at Ben Franklin's faithful Compass -- something appropriately missing from both the Perelman Quad and Wynn Commons.
(09/11/00 9:00am)
Oh there you are. You really can come out now. We've been looking for you for a long time, you know.
Seriously. We can see you under that pile of overpriced textbooks.
Yes, the presidential election is in full swing after pit stops in Philadelphia and Los Angeles, and it's about time we made our so-called voices heard. To provide a quick refresher for those who have had better things to do with their time, I've sorted out the previous year of campaigning in the next 197 words:
Former President George Bush's son went to Yale, learned that the Texas National Guard is close enough to Vietnam -- it's certainly closer than Oxford -- and failed in the oil business. His hobbies include following the Texas Rangers and executing people. He's running for president because it was really cool when his dad was in the White House.
Al Gore went to Harvard, roomed with Tommy Lee Jones and married a girl named Tipper -- 'nuff said. He's amazingly boring, but got lucky to match up with someone more snooze-worthy in the primary. He's running for president because the Democratic Party is guaranteed a spot in the general election, and he's the sitting vice president in a party starved for leadership. If they could, the Democrats would overturn the 22nd Amendment and nominate Clinton just to stick it to the Republicans.
Early exits: John McCain ran as a war hero and reformer but energized more Democrats than Republicans. Bill Bradley went to Princeton and got what he deserved -- loser status.
Also-rans: Ralph Nader is still unsafe at any speed, especially with the Green Party. Pat Buchanan and John Hagelin dismantled and embarrassed the third party movement.
So that's the wrap-up -- but the rest is up to you.
You see there's this thing that we get to do in this country -- our forefathers actually risked their lives for it -- elect our executive leader once every four years.
Some of you are political junkies who have been waiting for this chance to vote for a long time. Others may not like any of the options -- trust me, that's understandable given the choices.
The weird thing about voting is that for every vote that goes uncast, the others carry a greater weight. And some other voters are voting for Buchanan.
That means in your silence, you are supporting candidates you may dislike, in my case Buchanan. (And to the Buchanan supporters out there, feel free to send letters -- we're all dying to know who you are.)
Don't buy into the hype that by not voting you're making your displeasure heard. What you are doing is undermining our entire age group.
Why do you think the major issues in the general election are prescription medicine, health care and estate taxes? Why aren't they college loans, the war on drugs, campaign finance reform and the wage gap?
Because you don't vote. Our age group volunteers more than any other, but when the time comes for the voting booth, we shy away from our civic duty. The walk to DRL really is quite taxing, isn't it? Instead, we'd rather the senior citizens in Florida and the soccer moms around the country select our leadership and dictate policy. We'll stay at home and complain the system is corrupt.
If we don't vote, we'll only reaffirm what our elders already believe -- that we're a collection of apathetic, uninterested slackers, underachievers of the Bart Simpson mold, Nintendo-raised zombies who don't give a damn.
But we're more than that. We have a conscience, we haven't sold out -- yet -- and we can tell the nation we're not letting them give up on us.
Go out and vote. Vote for Bush, Gore, Nader, Hagelin or, heaven help us, Buchanan. Go to the voting booth to write in someone you think is willing to serve and would do a good job. Write in McCain, write in Bradley, write in Keyes, write in someone who at one point made you say, "Damn straight!"
Know this: Your vote will not decide the outcome of the election, even in a tight race in an important electoral state like Pennsylvania.
What it will decide is longer lasting. Your vote will make our generation a voice to be heard and catered to in future elections.
Then you can crawl back under your work -- you'll find out that four years from now, the politicians will be knocking at your door, asking what issues matter to you
