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(03/26/98 10:00am)
A few dabs of fresh paint, a couple of wall partitions and some new phone lines, and pretty soon the former Division of Public Safety headquarters and annex in Superblock will be transformed into two new centers of student activity. The $1.2 million renovations to the "white house," at 3914 Locust Walk and the two-story annex behind it will begin Monday, turning the two historic buildings into new office space for several student groups currently housed in Houston Hall. The buildings should be ready by the end of May, when Houston Hall closes for extensive renovations. The renovated Houston Hall will form part of the $69 million Perelman Quad project, which will link Houston, Logan, Williams and College halls with the rehabilitated Irvine Auditorium, forming a new student center in the heart of campus. The massive project is scheduled for completion by 2000. The three-story white house was originally built in the early 19th century to house the minister for the adjacent St. Mary's Episcopalian church, according to Project Manager Mike Swiszcz. The location will house the new Civic House, a non-residential center intended to promote and assist community service projects and to facilitate service learning, according to English Professor Peter Conn, who will serve as the house's faculty advisor. Conn added that the office of the Program for Student-Community Involvement, currently located on the second floor of Houston Hall, will be "merged" into Civic House as well. The house was initially named the Community Service Hub, but students involved in its creation wavered between names until they finally settled on Civic House about three weeks ago. Among the many reasons the new name was chosen, according to planning committee member Hillary Aisenstein, was that the group "didn't like the word 'hub' because it kind of sounded funny." Aisenstein, a College junior, added that the future facility's proximity to West Philadelphia allows it to be accessible to both students and to the city community, making it "symbolically" important. "I like the fact that it looks like a little house," she said. "It looks like a nice warm place to go. There's really nothing like that in the center of campus." The red building, known as the "carriage house" and built in the mid-19th century, recently served as Public Safety's annex. It will be home to the Office of Student Life Activities and Facilities, Penn Student Agencies and the six branches of the undergraduate student government. The Undergraduate Assembly, the Nominations and Elections Committee, the Social Planning and Events Committee, the Student Committee on Undergraduate Education, the Student Activities Council and the class boards will all be "sharing this wonderful big room on the second floor," according to Director of Student Life Activities and Facilities Fran Walker. PSA and Walker's office will be on the first floor. "I think the big office with all the sharing is a prime opportunity for all the branches of student government to collaborate more," said UA Chairperson Noah Bilenker, a College junior. The Office of Student Life and the student groups will occupy the carriage house temporarily -- until they can reclaim their new offices in the renovated Houston Hall. Renovations to the white house will begin Monday and renovations to the carriage house will begin about two weeks later, Swiszcz said. He added that both buildings will undergo an exterior painting and cleaning. Both will get new carpeting, an interior paint job, new wall partitions and some upgrades to their mechanical systems and their telephone and Internet connections. Both will allow for handicapped access to their first floor.
(03/24/98 10:00am)
David Brownlee, John Richetti and Neil Shubin will live in the high rises. They've spent decades in academia presenting lectures, conducting experiments and authoring books, rising to the tops of their chosen fields. Now, though, they face perhaps the greatest challenges of their careers -- turning high rises known for their sterility and coldness into viable, academically-stimulating college houses. Art History Professor David Brownlee, Biology Professor Neil Shubin and English Professor John Richetti will serve as faculty masters of Harnwell, Hamilton and Harrison college houses, Interim Provost Michael Wachter announced yesterday. The position puts them in charge of working with the approximately 800 residents in each of the three high rises to create the vision for and character of each house. The college house plan, which was announced in October, will reorganize the University's dormitories into 12 individual, multi-year houses with added programming, staff and academic support. A faculty master search committee of 11 members -- which included undergraduate and graduate students, representatives from the Office of Academic Programs and Residence Life and several professors -- met over the course of the last month, poring over an unspecified number of applications submitted by faculty members. "We wanted people who were first and foremost interested in undergraduate student life and the new college house system and who demonstrated that they were enthusiastic about the idea of academic and social programs in the residences," said David Fox, associate director of the office. The faculty masters will occupy renovated apartments on the 23rd floor of each high rise during their three-year, renewable terms. The apartments will contain two or three bedrooms, depending on the professor's preference, as well as new kitchens and other amenities, according to Residence Life officials. The apartments will have about 1,000 square feet of space. Ware College House and Stouffer College House -- both of which are looking to replace outgoing faculty masters --Ewill be the next facilities to search for faculty members. These searches should be completed by mid-April, officials said. The faculty masters will then work with Residence Life to select faculty fellows -- additional in-house faculty members to help plan activities -- to live in their houses. Brownlee: Sunrise, sunset Brownlee, 46, a historian of modern architecture who's done most of his work overseas, will leave his two-story row house on the 4300 block of Osage Avenue to live in Harnwell, or High Rise East. He said he can't wait to see the view out of his apartment on the 23rd floor, the building's second-highest residential floor. "I love sunrises and sunsets from high up and watching the weather come in across the countryside," Brownlee said, admitting that this is just the "narrow, selfish part" of why he's excited to move. "Harnwell, with its collection of existing residential programs, fits very well with my wife's interests and mine," Brownlee said. Brownlee, who conceived much of the college house plan, describes himself as an avid concert- and theater-goer. His profile aligns him with Harnwell's international, cultural and arts-based programming. Brownlee's wife, Ann Blair Brownlee, is an adjunct professor in the Art History Department. She specializes in Greek art and is a senior research scientist at the University Museum. In addition, she plans to take a special interest in Harnwell's new Ancient Studies/University Museum residential program, which will make its debut on the building's 14th floor this fall. Aside from the view outside his window, how does the art historian plan to decorate the interior of his new apartment? "Very carefully," Brownlee said, adding that he plans to bring "a few well-chosen things to put on the walls" and some "handsome old furniture" from his house. Shubin: Nowhere to put the gear Shubin, a paleobiologist who will move into the 23rd floor of Hamilton, or High Rise North, does not yet have decorating plans that are as specific as Brownlee's. "I have no idea," the 37-year-old Shubin said. "I'm taking a leap into the void." Shubin said the main concern he and his wife, Michele Seidl, are facing at the moment is where in their high rise apartment they will store Shubin's field gear when they move out of their house in the city's Chestnut Hill section. Shubin spends his summers doing international paleontology field work -- collecting fossils -- and living in sleeping bags and tents. He will spend this summer in Greenland. The faculty master, according to Shubin, should act as an "ambassador" to the house, trying to engage the rest of the University in the activities of the house and inviting faculty to the house for discussion forums and seminars which "will extend from formal classes and discussion groups to dinners and cocktail parties." Seidl, who has held jobs as an investment banker and a geologist, now works with the Pew Charitable Trusts' Higher Education Program, distributing the giant charity's money to researchers. Shubin said Seidl wants to create a "women in science" forum, drawing from her own experiences, for the house. The couple will bring along their cat Pandora, whom Shubin describes as "a goof." "She'll be our mascot," he said. And, he assured, "she loves people." Richetti: Visions of dinner parties Richetti, "a vigorous 59," said he plans to use his living room to host buffet suppers so residents can sample the cooking talents of Richetti's wife, Temple University English Professor Deirdre David, whom he describes as a "cordon bleu-quality cook." He said his objective for next year is to create a sense of community in Harrison, or High Rise South. "The emphasis has to be on the search for ways to turn these apartment buildings into meaningful collegiate units," he said. "It won't happen overnight, and it's important to be enthusiastic, as I am." The professor of 18th-century English literature -- who has won numerous awards including a Guggenheim fellowship and a Lindback Award for teaching -- said he plays squash "like a demon," with "limited skill and great energy." He added that he often plays squash with English Professor Al Filreis, the faculty master of Van Pelt College House, where Richetti has served as faculty fellow for the last two years.
(03/19/98 10:00am)
At 13 feet by 9 feet, Hill House dorm rooms are not exactly roomy. And the fact that each room's two beds can't be bunked makes for even more cramped quarters. But with the new furniture that was installed in her room last month -- including a bed that can be stacked -- College freshman Jaime Hojdila has a bit more room to stretch out her legs. Hojdila and five other Hill residents are currently sampling new furniture that will replace the decades-old beds, desks and shelves in all Hill dorm rooms over the next two years. Redecorating Hill's approximately 300 rooms and replacing the building's hot water system will be the first step in a 10-year plan to renovate all of the University's residences, according to Associate Vice President for Campus Services Larry Moneta. Moneta said his goal is to try to replace all of Hill's furniture -- which is more 30 years old -- by the end of the summer. Realistically, however, the project may take longer, he said, but "no more than two years." The total cost of the furniture replacement is estimated at $300,000 to $400,000. Funding will come from the University's reserve fund for such projects. A 3 percent increase in room rates will supplement the funding. Three different furniture companies have contributed the nearly identical trial furniture that was installed in three Hill rooms last month. Officials will select one company this spring to furnish the entire house. In the meantime, the residents of rooms 262, 341 and 466 have been opening their doors to other Hill residents to give them a preview of the new design. The house staff will collect evaluations from residents during the next couple of months. The six students who volunteered their rooms as samples are giving the decor an all-around thumbs-up. "It reminds me of a furniture store," Hojdila said. "Everything is new and smells like wood." Hojdila added that she and her roommate bunked their beds, which freed up one side of the room. In her old bed, she felt like she was "sleeping on an army cot." Engineering freshman Richard Dela Rosa said a new desk with a sliding keyboard compartment allows him and his roommate to sit at their desks without their chairs touching. "We actually have to hand each other the phone this time," Dela Rosa said. Dela Rosa and his roommate also bunked their new beds, which, he said, takes getting used to. "Whenever I wake up to my alarm, I pop my head against the ceiling," he said. College freshman Tomoko Machida said she now has more storage space because the new beds in her room have drawers. But Machida and her roommate did not bunk their beds. As a result, with the wide new beds claiming two sides of the room, there is actually less space than before, she said. "My roommate and I keep colliding into each other," Machida said, adding that their two chairs also collide when they both sit at their desks. Despite the cramped quarters, Machida said she recommends the new decor, adding that "it makes the room look a lot warmer." Hill Assistant Dean Tracy Feld said she is impressed with the amount of student input involved in this project. Moneta said his office will choose a furniture supplier on the basis of price, quality and student preference. "I love the way we did this," he said. "We're really involving students in the selection process." The other renovation to Hill this summer will be the replacement of the building's current hot water system, which Moneta called "unpredictable and unreliable," with a more modern system. According to Al Zuino, associate director of operations in residential maintenance, the existing water boiler has sat in Hill's basement since the facility was first built 38 years ago. The new system will heat water instantaneously rather than storing water and heating it on demand, as the current system does. In addition to the interior renovations at Hill, upcoming projects in the 10-year renovation plan include a fitness center to be installed in High Rise South's rooftop lounge by this fall, as well as several plumbing and alarm system upgrades. Moneta said his office will try to make a detailed projection of the full 10-year plan available before the end of the semester.
(03/18/98 10:00am)
When the nationwide search for house deans of the 12 college houses comes to a close today, faculty members involved in the search say they expect to have more than 100 candidates for the positions. The college house plan -- announced last October -- calls for the organization of the University's residences into 12 multi-year college houses with added programming and academic support. A house dean will live in each house and take the lead in coordinating academic programming and support services for house residents. The new position, with its added academic responsibilities, will replace the current administrative fellow and assistant dean positions in the existing college houses. An advertisement requesting applications appeared in The New York Times and The Philadelphia Inquirer on February 15 and in the Chronicle of Higher Education on February 27. It called for candidates possessing an "advanced degree (doctorate preferred)" and experience working in "a residential college environment" in an advising or teaching role. Art History Professor David Brownlee, who is directing the college house implementation process, said the committee selecting the deans had, as of Monday, enough applications in their hands for "several large universities." "We're prepared to have and expect to have more than 100 applications," he said. The central screening committee will begin reviewing the applications, which are arriving from all across the country, this week. The committee is chaired by Engineering Professor David Pope and includes representatives from the office of Academic Programs and Residence Life, the four undergraduate schools' advising offices, the Residential Advisory Board and two faculty members -- College Dean Richard Beeman and English Professor Al Filreis, who also serves as chairperson of the Residential Faculty Council. Brownlee said the committee will identify the strongest candidates and then invite the individual college houses to select which candidates to interview from among them. The interview process will run through April. The houses will then rank their preferences and send these to Residence Life, which will ultimately oversee the deans' contracts. The deans will take office on July 1. Faculty masters and faculty fellows will join the house deans in providing in-house guidance and support for residents in the new college houses. The deans will serve as "deputies" of the faculty masters, who -- through consultation with the residents -- will create the vision for the house, according to Brownlee. The undergraduate schools will also play a major role in the programming of the college houses and in training the house deans. Faculty masters for the 12 houses have yet not been appointed. Interim Provost Michael Wachter is overseeing that search, and officials from his the Provost's office said the first of the appointments may be announced by the end of this week.
(03/05/98 10:00am)
Several dorms said they will name some of their graduate associates. As the University's 12 college houses prepare to send out offers tomorrow to prospective graduate associates, officials are reporting mixed results in how many staff applications have been received by the various houses. As of yesterday, 91 students had applied for the 104 positions. The most recent breakdown of applications by house was done Monday, however, when only 89 students had applied, Director of Academic Programs and Residence Life Chris Dennis said. According to those numbers, 17 students submitted 34 applications for 26 positions in the Quadrangle. Applicants can choose to interview with all 12 of the houses. "They're light right now," Residence Life Director Chris Dennis said last week about applications for the Quad. "We always knew that would be the toughest sell." While the fewest applications have been directed at the Quad houses, the high rises -- which have the largest number of available spots -- have received the most applications, with 80 for 33 spots. But the pool of candidates applying to be GAs in the Quad, as well as the other houses, is impressive, according to many of the residential staff members conducting the interviews. "We were quite impressed by the candidates," said outgoing Ware College House Faculty Master Jan Van der Spiegel, an Electrical Engineering professor. He noted that Ware residents have interviewed most of the candidates and will be ready to begin making offers to some of them tomorrow. And King's Court/English House Faculty Master Jorge Santiago-Aviles described his pool of 25 applicants as "outstanding." Jane Rogers -- who is assistant dean of soon-to-be-defunct Butcher-Speakman-Class of 1928 but is coordinating the hiring process for Goldberg House this year -- said "a couple" of prospective GAs have withdrawn their applications from Goldberg since the interviewing process began. Still, she's not concerned about the smaller applicant pool. Referring to her past experience in hiring resident advisers, Rogers said she has "found some of my best staff in the spring." But Community House Faculty Master Stephen Gale, a Regional Science professor, said he's aware that the 10 graduate students who have applied to live in his house have probably applied to many other houses. He said the number can be deceiving. Gale added that he would rather say that "only 10 people have applied as GAs to us." But Rogers said Goldberg House is prepared for the competition, and "will go to work" to convince GAs who have received other offers to work for the house. Officials at Residence Life said they expect "many more" applications to arrive in their office this semester -- especially with the recent launch of a new marketing campaign. Last Friday, Residence Life sent out a mailing to all current graduate students, reminding them of the open positions. Next month, all incoming graduate students will get the letter. The office also produced a new brochure and an enhanced GA Web site last week. The School of Arts and Sciences, the Graduate School of Education and the School of Social Work have begun to nominate students who are eligible for certain fellowship awards, or financial packages from their departments, for GA positions.
(03/03/98 10:00am)
If everything had gone as planned for the Graduate School of Fine Arts in the past year, College senior John La Bombard may not have been in the Blauhaus Gallery Sunday afternoon when a stray bullet from outside went through the wall, striking him in the thigh. The one-story blue shed at 33rd and Chestnut streets was built in the summer of 1992 as a temporary facility when the school vacated Smith Hall, which was demolished in 1995 to make way for the new Roy and Diana Vagelos Laboratories. The Blauhaus was supposed to house the Fine Arts Department for no more than five years while Penn found GSFA a permanent home. But when the almost-completely renovated Addams Hall suddenly burnt down last March, plans to move out of the Blauhaus were put on hold. "We intentionally built [the Blauhaus] cheaply," said Art Gravina, who headed the University's facilities management division until late last year. The plywood walls of the $1 million structure are about 3 inches thinner than the walls of a standard permanent structure, according to Reid Reames, vice president at Architecture Design Alliance Inc. in Philadelphia and a 1981 GSFA graduate. According to University spokesperson Ken Wildes, Addams Hall -- which was scheduled to be completed by last September -- was "on schedule and under budget" at the time of the four-alarm blaze that destroyed it. And when the University had to begin its search for a permanent Fine Arts site again from scratch, the Blauhaus went from being a temporary site to one that would indefinitely house Fine Arts. Wildes said GSFA may have a new home in less than three years. La Bombard was in the Blauhaus finishing up a Design of the Environment woodworking project Sunday afternoon when a stray bullet, fired from a car outside, pierced the building's walls and hit him in the lower thigh. "That's pretty insane," College senior Jim Gatta, who spends much of his time in the Blauhaus darkroom, said of Sunday's incident. "You're working on something, you're drawing something, and a bullet just comes through the wall and grazes you in the knee." The fact that a bullet was able to pass through the walls raises questions about the quality of the Blauhaus' structure. One bullet made its way through the two layers of plywood and fiberglass insulation, hitting La Bombard. Two other bullets made it through only the first layer of wood before getting in the insulation. The Blauhaus passed "all the appropriate" city building regulations when it was built, said Gravina, who works for the Trammell Crow Co. Philadelphia follows the Boca Code, a national standard for rating buildings on such things as fire prevention. Temporary and permanent buildings are set at the same standards, according to Jim Kilcoyne, co-owner of Apple Construction Inc. in Philadelphia. But Fine Arts students said Blauhaus is "not well constructed" and "neglected." One student called it a "blue, unventilated barrack." Many said they want to see the building improved. Gravina said it's unlikely the building will undergo any renovations. "I can't imagine we'd ever do that," he said. "All that does is reinforce its permanency versus its being a temporary building." Witnesses described the scene inside the Fine Arts building immediately following the gunshots on Sunday as one of "chaos and confusion," as police ushered the students to the back of the building. Several students at the Blauhaus yesterday said they thought Sunday's shootings were an isolated incident and wouldn't scare them away from continuing to use the building's facilities. "Blauhaus" literally means "blue house" in German. The name is a play on the Bauhaus, a school of modernist art and architecture that flourished in Germany in the early part of this century.
(03/03/98 10:00am)
Engineering freshman Rana Mitra didn't expect that witnessing a shooting through his dormitory window would be part of his first-year experience at Penn. The Hill House resident watched the shootings Sunday afternoon near 33rd and Walnut streets -- which left one person dead and three people wounded, including one University student -- from his fourth-floor window. The violence followed the Philadelphia Public League high school boys basketball championship at the Palestra. "Just a few days ago I was saying to myself that Philly isn't all that bad -- it's just got a bad rep," Mitra said, adding that seeing someone "gunned down" outside his window changed his opinion of the city. The shootings hit close to home for Hill House residents, many of whom witnessed the incident and questioned their own safety -- especially since a bullet could have conceivably flown through a window into the five-story dormitory. Hill House staff members have been meeting with students since Sunday's incident to discuss fears or questions regarding the shooting. Last night, about a dozen residents and graduate fellows met with approximately 10 administrators -- representing the Office of the Vice Provost for University Life, the Department of Public Safety and Counseling and Psychological Services -- in Hill's Upper East Lounge to discuss the shootings. University Chaplain William Gipson also participated in the informal meeting. Mitra's window overlooks the Blauhaus, where a College senior working on a project inside was struck in the lower thigh by a bullet that made its way through the Fine Arts building's plywood walls. "That was pretty concerning," Mitra said. "It could've come through my window and hit me." But Hill Faculty Master Jim O'Donnell said the Blauhaus incident does not raise concerns about bullets flying through Hill's windows, noting that many of the windows are relatively small. "If you look at Hill, our windows are not huge," said O'Donnell, a Classical Studies professor who is also vice provost for information systems and computing. "Sometimes that's a negative, but sometimes that's a positive." College freshman Amy Strain, whose lives on the street level, said she doesn't feel any less safe than she did before Sunday. "Nobody is really upset," Strain said, recalling a discussion led by her graduate fellow Sunday night. "We all feel it's a random incident that's unlikely to happen again." She did add, however, that "people were kind of freaked out by the fact that a bullet could go through our windows." Hill Graduate Fellow Sanjay Udani stressed that "the bigger concern is about the event itself." "If it's consistently causing problems, why is the event still being held at Penn?" asked Udani.
(02/26/98 10:00am)
Michael Rose will join the Center in the midst of a tough reorganization. After a six-month search and a short delay in the actual appointment, Interim Provost Michael Wachter named a new managing director for the troubled Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts yesterday. Michael Rose, formerly the executive director of the Glassboro Center for the Arts at Rowan University in New Jersey, will begin his new post at Annenberg on March 16. Rose replaces Stephen Goff, a 1964 University graduate who had held the position for 22 years before resigning last August amid the center's continuing financial troubles. Rose "brings very strong financial, marketing and managerial skills" to the center, making him "the ideal manager of a performing arts studio in the 21st century," Wachter said. Rose's appointment comes in the midst of Annenberg's three-year reorganization process, the result of a six-month internal review led by Wachter last year. The restructuring plan -- a response to the theater's recent financial difficulties -- calls for adding concerts, film series and lectures to the center's current offerings in children's theater, student performances, dance and professional productions such as 1996's Angels in America. With the demise of the Drama Guild -- a performing arts company that presented many of its plays at Annenberg and was a prime part of the center's financial operations -- four years ago, the center was faced with a budget deficit. It subsequently responded by cutting back on programming. The center has run a deficit for six of the last nine years. According to recent University budget figures, the Annenberg Center was budgeted for a $293,000 deficit for fiscal year 1998, which ends June 30, 1998. "As the environment became more difficult, it became more critical to us to have the kind of dynamic leadership that can deal with that environment," Wachter said. Wachter said he first heard of Rose while driving along the Schuylkill Expressway one morning and hearing a radio advertisement Rose created for a performance in Glassboro. "If somebody is trying to get me to go to the performing arts in South Jersey, that's the person I want here on campus, getting people into University City," Wachter said. Rose led Glassboro for 10 years, and focused much of his work on community outreach, including organizing a matinee program to bring area schoolchildren to performances. Rose said he hopes to bring this kind of community outreach to Annenberg, noting that universities "tend to be too isolated from the communities that surround them." He also said collaborating with student groups in putting together programming for the center would be a priority because he "can't work in a vacuum." Diversifying the professional performances offered at the center, Rose said, might draw larger student audiences to Annenberg, although he insisted that he doesn't "have a specific agenda." "I think what I need to do when I get here is? listen to a lot of people and get a sense of what will work," he said. A "broad base" of offering gives the theater "much more stability," Rose added. Annenberg's reorganization process will not affect student performance groups, which Wachter said are "very strong." He added that he hopes Rose will succeed in attracting students to the center's professional performances. The search for the new managing director was conducted by a seven-member committee chaired by Wachter, which included College senior Liz Scanlon, the chairperson of the Performing Arts Council. Members of Annenberg's staff were initially told that the search would be completed by January, according to Goff. Goff had agreed to stay on at the center during the transition. But, as Wachter explained, the search committee "wanted to be thorough," adding that he was "more deliberate than [he] might've thought."
(02/25/98 10:00am)
Most patrons of Van Pelt Library would agree that the reverberating rhythms of jackhammers and drills are not conducive to studying. Library administrators had similar concerns when they changed the ground-floor Rosengarten Reserve room's late-night hours two weeks ago to allow the noisiest construction to take place when the library is closed. But since then, many students studying in Rosengarten have expressed concern about the early closing hours. Since February 9, Rosengarten has been closing at midnight Sunday through Thursday nights. Hours in the rest of the library -- which used to close considerably earlier than Rosengarten -- remain unchanged and now closely mirror Rosengarten's hours. That will soon change. According to library spokesperson Patricia Renfro, Rosengarten will keep its doors open until 3 a.m. on weeknights beginning March 16. On April 1, the area will return to its regular 7 a.m. closing time. Still, many students said they were disappointed that they could not find comparable study space after midnight. Although Steinberg-Dietrich Hall is open 24 hours, many students complain that it is too crowded and that desks in classrooms are not quite the same as large library tables. "If they were going to close down the place, they should have made arrangements to open other buildings," said Undergraduate Assembly Vice Chairperson Samara Barend. "That would have been the responsible thing to do." The early closing hours were the topic of discussion at a Tangible Change Committee meeting last Thursday, when a student who had been "displaced from her regular study location" shared her complaints with the student-run group, according to Barend, the committee chairperson and a College junior. But Barend, a Daily Pennsylvanian columnist, said that after addressing the issue with Renfro earlier this week, she feels "assured" that the hours will be "brought back to normal" later this spring. Construction crews are currently working on the fourth phase of the library's rehabilitation project. In December, they completed the new reference facilities and study area on the building's first floor. Renovations to the library's main entrance and circulation center should be completed by August. Renfro said that library administrators didn't realize until the end of January that they would need to close Rosengarten at midnight, rather than 2 a.m., the time it was closing at the start of the semester. She explained that the construction crews needed a larger pocket of time to allow them to do the "very, very noisy demolition and drilling" each night. Two stairwells -- one leading from the ground floor to the main floor, and one leading from the main floor to the mezzanine -- are being demolished between midnight and 8 a.m. nightly as part of the renovations to the building's east side. "We're really sorry about [the early closing], but we can't have that noisy construction going on while [Rosengarten] is open," Renfro said. "It's just impossible for people to stay there." She said that Van Pelt does not "have any alternatives for late at night," adding that Steinberg-Dietrich is the only other late-night study option she could suggest. But some students do not like that option. College junior Paul Christner said he does not study at Steinberg-Dietrich because "the library's a better environment to study in than classrooms, per se." Barend said she still thinks "accommodations need to be made in other locations," citing College and Logan halls as possibilities. She added that she worries that the imminent closing of other University buildings, such as Houston Hall, for renovations will lead to similar concerns for alternate space.
(02/23/98 10:00am)
The hall, which serves about 300 athletes, will be demolished to build a new coaching center. Since 1908, dinner with the team at the William White Training House after practice has been a nightly tradition for University athletes. But after the spring semester, these dinners will be a thing of the past. Plans to renovate the three-floor training house -- which was built in 1906 as a residential and dining facility for athletes -- to create Athletic Department office space were announced last October. But at that point, the future of the Dining Services facility in the building's basement and first floor was still unclear. In late December, the Athletic Department confirmed in a memo sent to Dining Services that the "T-house" dining hall on South 33rd Street next to Franklin Field will shut down in preparation for the interior demolition of the lower half of the building. T-house will serve its last meal on April 22, according to Dining Services Director Bill Canney. Athletics Director Steve Bilsky said his department is "really excited" about the creation of a much-needed coaching center in the dining hall's former space. "Right now our coaches are scattered all over the place in different buildings," he said, adding that starting this fall, T-house will house all coaches' offices except those for football, squash, tennis and swimming. But as the closing date approaches, T-house dining employees say they are growing more and more worried about the future of their jobs. Many are also skeptical that the approximately 300 athletes who regularly dine at T-house will be adequately accommodated by another dining hall. According to Associate Vice President for Campus Services Larry Moneta, "no one will be affected" by the closing of T-house, and all employees will be guaranteed jobs. "Every employee involved will be absorbed into the dining system," Moneta said. Many of T-house's 36 employees, however, said they have not received any such assurances or information about their future. "No one has told me a thing yet," said Jim Walden, T-house food service manager. Walden, a 22-year veteran of the dining hall, said he was "very shocked and very hurt" when he read the December 23rd memo from the Athletics Department to Dining officials, confirming the closing of the dining hall. "Yes, I knew there were plans to renovate the top two floors, but I had no idea there were plans to do anything with the bottom two," he said. Other employees shared Walden's confusion. "We don't know where we're going or anything," said College sophomore Delia Gable, T-house's student supervisor for the evening shift. "We feel kind of helpless here." Dennis Deegan, a staff and labor relations specialist for the Division of Human Resources, said his office has been communicating directly with the employees' union, rather than the employees themselves. T-house has five full-time unionized employees and 31 part-time workers. "At this stage, I don't think there's been a formal communication to the employees," Deegan said. Walden said he's had a hard time telling his employees -- some of whom have been at T-house for nearly 30 years -- that their workplace will be demolished. Canney said a new dining facility will not be created to replace T-house. He added that "we're using the present facilities that we have." The dining hall at Hill House near 34th and Walnut streets will likely be the new gathering spot for athletes, since it is located near T-house and maintains the same 5 p.m.-to-8 p.m. dinner hours. But some athletes and T-house employees say that won't work. "Hill is almost at capacity, and to bring another 300 kids -- they're going to feed them, but there are going to be some tremendous lines," Walden said. "I think it will be a very different atmosphere," said College junior Sherryl Fodera, a tri-captain of the softball team. "When you go into T-house, there are teams sitting there. I don't think it will be like that in any other dining hall." Canney said Dining will try to preserve some of the T-house traditions. He cited the "pre-game jitters" -- gatherings with refreshments for football coaches and parents of the players before games -- as a practice that will be maintained. The renovated Athletics facility, which should be completed before the fall semester, will be renamed the James Dunning Jr. Coaches Center, in honor of Dunning, a 1970 Wharton graduate who donated $1.5 million dollars towards the project last year. Demolition of the basement and first-floor interiors is scheduled to begin May 4. "I certainly believe the coaches need the offices," Executive Director of Hospitality Services Don Jacobs said. But he added that "we don't want to close [T-house]." "We love this place," Jacobs said.
(02/16/98 10:00am)
An infectious disease living-learning program will be offered next year. There's an added bonus for students looking to live in Spruce Street College House in the Quadrangle next year: infectious diseases in the residence. These won't hurt you, however. Microbiology Professor Helen Davies, senior faculty resident in the house, plans to implement an informal living and learning program on infectious diseases for the approximately 300 students living in the multi-year house next year. The program will explore the subject in terms of its history, its sociology and its anthropological aspects. There are even "areas of business" that may be explored, Davies said. An in-house course would be offered in the spring semester to about 18 students -- half of them Spruce residents and half Benjamin Franklin Scholars. The course would be much like Davies' popular fall semester General Honors class on the interactions between humans and infectious agents such as bacteria, viruses and parasites. The course -- General Medicine 73 -- normally has a large waiting list for admission. Inspired by the implementation of the college house plan, which was announced in October, Davies wanted to bring a course she has taught to medical students and undergraduates into her dormitory. The college house plan will organize the University's residences into 12 multi-year houses with added programming by this fall. One of the benefits of the program, according to administrators, is that it will allow distinctive focuses and activities to develop in the residences. Davies said she was pleased with the plan because it encourages a system "where you're learning in the place where you're living," citing Oxford and Cambridge universities in England as prime examples. "Penn's entitled to a big, long experiment to see how it can be done here," she said. Davies added that there isn't a single person who "shouldn't know something about infectious diseases." Several of Davies' former students expressed enthusiasm about the proposed living-learning program, and praised the professor for her teaching of the class. "It's an incredible course," said College junior Amy Raphael, who took Davies' course last semester. "She's so excited about the topic, and [her excitement is] very contagious." Raphael -- who is also a resident adviser in Spruce and is helping to coordinate the living-learning program -- explained that one floor of Spruce will be designated this fall "for the study of infectious disease." "In general, when you refer to [the program floor] you have to preface it with 'study of' so you don't think you're living with diseased people," Raphael said, laughing. Raphael said she wants to see the program reach beyond Spruce to educate the student body about infectious diseases -- including sexually transmitted diseases -- and methods of prevention. "Once you start learning about this stuff, you're a sucker for life," Raphael said, adding that she now reads The New York Times' "Science Times" section every Tuesday to learn more about diseases she studied in Davies' class. A possible in-house program on women in science is also in the works for Spruce, to be introduced within the next couple of years.
(02/12/98 10:00am)
As the University prepares to launch 12 new college houses this fall, preliminary numbers indicate an increase in applications to the five current college houses. The plan to reorganize University residences into 12 houses with added programming was partly modeled after the existing college houses, such as Stouffer, Van Pelt, Modern Languages and W.E.B. DuBois. After last Friday's deadline for students to submit applications to retain their rooms in the high rises or apply to live in one of the University's other nine residences, most of the current college houses reported increases in the number of applications and retentions. At the same time, the number of applications for high rise retentions may be "slightly" lower this year, according to Ellie Rupsis, associate director of occupancy administration. Education graduate student Deborah James, an administrative fellow at Stouffer College House, said she has already received more than 50 applications from current residents for the building's 131 rooms, as well as several applications from students living outside the residence. "We actually have exceeded our goal," James said. Modern Languages College House -- which will merge next year with Van Pelt College House to form Gregory House -- had received 41 applications as of last night. Administrative Fellow David Miller said the house will "probably have 45 by the end of the week." The program expects to house 82 students. "We've never been that high this early before," the Germanic Languages graduate student said. Miller added that teams of MLCH residents visited "all the language classes" last week to recruit students to the house. And applications rose to the Ware College House in the Quadrangle as well, with 100 students applying for the house's 422 spots. But applications did not increase to all of the houses. Van Pelt College House, which will house 169 students, has "about the same" number of applications for rooms as last year, said Administrative Fellow Kei Sochi. Sochi said she has counted 63 applications thus far. Administrators at DuBois, which will house 204 students, would not release information on their applicant pool. One administrator said the Office of Academic Programs and Residence Life had prohibited them from speaking to The Daily Pennsylvanian. Chris Dennis, director of the office, confirmed that he issued such an order because officials want "a chance to assess all the numbers and compare them to past trends."
(02/12/98 10:00am)
Large numbers of freshmen decided to remain in their dorms. When the college house plan designed to turn all Penn dormitories into multi-year houses was announced last October, skeptics feared that current freshman dormitories would fail to attract upperclassmen. But preliminary retention and applications numbers indicate that many of the current freshmen will retain their rooms in what are now freshman dormitories -- the Quadrangle, King's Court/English House and Hill House -- as sophomores. At the same time, the Assignments Office has reported a slight decrease in the number of upperclassmen retaining rooms in the high rises. The deadline for room retention requests in most residences was last Friday. Preliminary counts indicate that retention is down by "30 to 40" applications in the high rises, according to Ellie Rupsis, associate director of occupancy administration. Information on how many residents chose not to retain their high rise rooms in order to switch to other rooms within the high rises will not be available until next month. Unlike the high rises, where students can apply for rooms beginning next Monday, the former freshman houses have already accepted both retentions and new applications. The number of rising sophomores applying to live in freshman houses has exceeded the initial expectations of both faculty members and administrators. In October, when the college house plan was announced, administrators said they expected the traditional residential patterns of freshman and upperclassman houses to persist for the first few years of the new program. But Residential Faculty Council Chairperson Al Filreis, who helped develop the program, said he expected many students to see the value of multi-year housing. "I'm not really surprised, but I am very pleased that a number of students are taking seriously the idea that these are real communities. And communities consist of diverse groups of people," said Filreis, an English professor. The numbers for the Quad may be slightly inflated, however. Students could apply to all four Quad houses, leading residential staff members to assume some applications overlap. Diana Koros, assistant dean of Community House in the Quad, said 31 people applied to live in the house -- which will house 486 students next year -- as upperclassmen, adding that "it's more than we had last year." The 422-resident Ware College House in the Quad -- which next year will also include the Speakman, Bodine and Class of 1928 buildings -- will be at least one-fourth upperclassmen, according to Ware Administrative Fellow Peter Trinh. Trinh, a Bioengineering graduate student, said about 100 students are retaining their rooms, an increase from last year. Ware, which is already a college house, has traditionally housed more upperclassmen than most Quad dorms. But the three buildings which will be incorporated into Ware had previously housed soley freshmen. Fifty-four people applied for the room lottery for the 308 available spaces in Spruce Street House in the Quad, making at least one-sixth of the house upperclassmen, said Spruce Street Assistant Dean Debbi Yarber. Hill House, which will house 541 students, has had a "huge increase" in its applicant pool, with 106 rising sophomores applying for rooms, as compared to last year's 87. Thirty students are on a waiting list. Preliminary numbers in King's Court/English House, which will house 221 students in King's Court and 179 in English House, show an increase in the application rate, KC/EH Assistant Dean Krimo Bokreta said. Bokreta said he could not give precise numbers because the data for the houses' four residential programs -- the Science and Technology Wing, International Studies and Business, Biosphere and Prospective in the Humanities -- have not been tabulated. Staff members in Goldberg College House in the Quad did not return repeated telephone calls this week.
(02/04/98 10:00am)
Only about 40 applicants filled out forms for the 104 available positions. Less than one week after the preliminary application deadline for thegraduate students who will staff the new college houses, officials said yesterday that they have only received applications for about 40 of the 104 available positions. And a restructuring of the benefits package for the incoming graduate associates who will reside in the 12 college houses may result in an effective deduction of as much as $2,000 from their stipends, making the positions a lot less attractive. The Office of Academic Programs and Residential Life is searching for 104 graduate students, 34 more than last year, to serve as GAs under the new college house plan. The plan, which would reorganize the current residences into 12 houses, requires additional staff to administer expanded programming. APRL officials said they are not concerned about the number of applicants and will accept additional applications until they fill all the positions. But next year's benefits package for newly appointed GAs may be significantly less attractive than in past years. In an attempt to recruit GAs through their respective schools, APRL has arranged to link room and board benefits given to GAs with the stipends they receive from their schools. This stipend is likely to decrease next year, however. In order to help APRL pay for the new GAs, the schools will pay APRL $2,000 to cover the costs of each GA. As a result, the schools may deduct some of this amount from the GAs' stipends. This plan will not apply to current graduate fellows who retain their positions for next year, according to APRL Director Chris Dennis. Most schools will probably cut the full $2,000 from each GA's stipend, according to Sanjay Udani, chairperson of the Graduate and Professional Student Assembly and a Hill House graduate fellow for the last five years. Udani, an Engineering graduate student, said he worries that incoming GAs will be "effectively paid less" than current GAs by losing part of their expected stipend to APRL. But Dennis stressed that the loss in stipend will be more than offset by the $6,900 in room and board received by all GAs. APRL officials said they expect to fill all the positions, adding that it is not unusual to hire some GAs during the summer months. "It was always known that we would take applications as long as we needed them," APRL Associate Director David Fox said. Dennis said the recruitment process is "in pretty good shape for being this early in the process." But Udani, who is helping to conduct the GA selection process, said he doubts there will be many more applicants. All graduate students already received a call to apply over e-mail stressing last week's deadline. Most of those who wanted to apply already have, he said. As a result, Udani predicted APRL may be forced to "rely on the incoming [graduate] students, the new students, to fill up the spots." He added that it "might not be such a good idea," noting that graduate students who are themselves "adjusting" to a new school and new city will have a difficult time "trying to help other people who are adjusting." Fox said that "there isn't a preference" for current graduate students over incoming students, but he admitted that "a student who has already been here has some advantage" in the role of a GA. And Dennis said careful selection of GAs is important because they are supposed to "be intellectual role models" for their undergraduate housemates. APRL will continue to conduct information sessions for prospective GAs in the coming weeks. One is scheduled for tonight. Udani said he hopes APRL receives more applications soon. If there are not enough applications, APRL may not be able to be that selective, he said. Udani also expressed concern about the rolling application process. Since applications may come in a few at a time, it will be difficult to compare candidates, he said. Each college house interviews and selects its own GAs.
(02/02/98 10:00am)
As applications for room retention start rolling into the University's residential life offices later this week, student leaders hope the "Wheel" program -- which aims to improve academic services in residence -- will make them roll faster. In addition to administrative efforts to attract students to campus living, the Wheel, which moves tutoring, training and advising programs into dormitories, represents a major student-led effort to convince their peers to choose University housing. The Wheel consists of math, writing, information-technology and library tutoring programs that were consolidated into one body last September. It will also be part of the added programming included in the new college house plan, which will organize the University's residences into 12 houses starting next fall. The program got its name from a general feeling among faculty members and students that the idea of bringing academic support into residences was a way of "reinventing the wheel," according to English Professor Al Filreis, who chairs the Residential Faculty Council. "We weren't creating anything new," said Filreis, who serves as an informal adviser to the student-run Wheel. "We were essentially organizing a bunch of projects that were already in place and extending the notion." Officials are currently testing several additional programs, such as career advising, which is being piloted in the Van Pelt College House. Since the program is almost completely student-run -- students tutor, coordinate and interview prospective advisers -- the program's leaders say they are looking for many more students to participate. "There's so much going on in residences right now," said College junior Myra Lotto, coordinator of the electronic writing-advising program, who added that a slew of job opportunities will open up in the college houses next fall. "We really need upperclassmen who know what they're doing to stay in residences," Lotto added. Since the college house plan will make all residences multi-year, all advising programs which are not available in the high rises will be expanded to serve all residences. Currently, only the writing advising program is available in the high rises. Engineering junior Laura Kornstein, who coordinates the math advising program, said she is in the process of hiring five additional math advisers for this semester in order to meet the rising demand for math tutors and prepare for the program's expansion next fall. Kornstein first brought math support into the residences last fall by assigning undergraduate tutors to specific dorms. Under the previous system, tutors traveled among several locations. After conducting a survey, she found that the number of students seeking math support last semester more than tripled from last spring. More than 1,200 of these support requests occurred in residential math advising centers. Kornstein attributed the program's success to the ease and flexibility students found in having a tutor come into their own residence. College senior Steven Morgan Friedman, who created the library advising program the summer before his junior year, said he's available to offer support "24 hours a day." Friedman said his program will also hire additional advisers -- to assist students with library and computer research -- bringing the total to one for each of the 12 college houses next fall. The information-technology support program, which made its debut in residences last fall, will also be expanding in preparation for the college house plan. Information technology advisor Katherine Wu, an Engineering freshman, said the program will expand its 140-student staff to include managerial positions to coordinate the computer support in each residence. Friedman said his library advising program -- along with the other academic support programs -- should "motivate students to move on campus."
(01/29/98 10:00am)
The rooftop lounge will house equipment and an aerobics workout space. A new recreational facility containing exercise equipment and aerobics space in High Rise South will definitely be in place next fall, officials announced last night. Penn administrators had previously promised the facility would open in the building's rooftop lounge this semester. But construction was delayed in order to allow engineers to carefully survey the location, Associate Vice President for Campus Services Larry Moneta said. "We wanted it done right," he explained, adding that having engineers inspect the floor of the lounge to ensure that it could sustain the added weight of exercise equipment took longer than anticipated. Moneta, Recreation Director Mike Diorka and Assistant Director for Upperclass Students in Residence Rodney Robinson discussed the latest details of the facility at a meeting of the student Residential Advisory Board last night. The proposed workout space is the result of a collaborative effort between RAB and the student-run Tangible Change Committee to find new uses for the rooftop lounges and Rathskellar Lounges in the three high rises. Many students have described the University's current exercise facilities as inadequate. Moneta promised that "one way or another," the facility will be ready for business by the fall. There is, however, a possibility that parts of the facility will open at the end of this semester, according to RAB Chairperson Emily Pollack, a College sophomore. Robinson added that a delayed opening would allow the fitness center to debut at the same time as the new College House system -- which will reorganize the University's residences into 12 college houses with enhanced programming and added staff. The new exercise facility will house cardiovascular equipment -- such as stair climbers, ski machines, rowing machines and stationary bikes -- as well as a mirror-lined aerobics area. According to Pollack, students will be able to use the equipment for free. But students enrolled in aerobics classes would be charged a fee in a procedure similar to that taken at the Gimbel and Hutchinson Gymnasiums. The fitness center will be open to all students, not just high rise residents -- at least in the beginning. "Right now the plans are to make it accessible to anyone who's interested," Pollack said. "If there are problems with that, adjustments will have to be made." Pollack said her main concern initially was the "noise factor." But she said she feels assured that the padding which will line the floor of the lounge will be "definitely sufficient" to block noise from the floors below. Moneta said preparing the lounge for its future use will be "a moderate expense," although he does not yet know the exact cost.
(01/28/98 10:00am)
An accident during the renovations raised fears about loose asbestos. An "unanticipated" construction mishap that sent pieces of plaster falling from the ceiling of the ground-floor Rosengarten Reserve Room in Van Pelt Library last week has raised concerns about the presence of loose asbestos material in the library. The asbestos located throughout the library ceilings is not considered dangerous, according to administration and health officials. One health official warned, however, that continuing library construction on the first and second floors could pose a future hazard to students in the building. Asbestos is a silicon-rich mineral that was first used extensively in building materials in the early 1940s as a noise and fire retardant. The Environmental Protection Agency identified it as a "hazardous pollutant" in 1971 because studies linked it to several forms of cancer, including lung cancer. Many buildings built before the 1970s -- including several at the University -- are constructed of material containing asbestos. According to the EPA, exposure to asbestos becomes hazardous only when damage to a building loosens the mineral into the air in its fibrous form. That's exactly what happened last week at the library, which was constructed during the 1960s. Last Wednesday morning, College senior Rebecca Blank was sitting in the rear of Rosengarten, on the Walnut Street side, when a large piece of plaster fell from the ceiling and landed a few yards away from her. According to Vice Provost and Director of Libraries Paul Mosher, one of the construction workers on the floor above used "too long a drill" and accidentally drilled a hole through the ceiling of Rosengarten. Blank said that a library employee "came up to me and? said, 'You have to vacate the area immediately, because there's been an unforeseen asbestos danger.' " Library staff members told Blank and about 15 other students sitting near her to evacuate, leading them toward the library's main exit. The students passed the pile of debris as they walked out. Mosher said the University's Office of Environmental Health and Radiation Safety arrived to inspect the area "in less than an hour." Matt Finucane, director of the office, said the University sent a team trained in cleaning asbestos to close off the area and clean up the debris using "special vacuum cleaners." The team also took air samples -- which showed no significant contamination. Roman Siletsky, an industrial hygienist for the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration office in Philadelphia, said he doesn't think "anyone sustained any kind of significant exposure." "Sure, there's some asbestos contamination there, but nothing anywhere near anything that would create an OSHA problem, as long as they got people out of the area, and someone came to clean it up," Siletsky said. But Blank said she returned to the library Friday and saw a small piece of plaster still on the ground, which, she recalled, had a chair over it. She also found that the office windows near where the incident took place still had a film of dried debris on them. Blank added that she was concerned that she and the students evacuated from the library on Wednesday exited by walking a few feet away from the debris. "That shouldn't have happened," Siletsky said. "They should've walked people around it and not through it." Mosher claimed that "there's only one way" to exit. However, there is an emergency fire exit in the back of Rosengarten. Siletsky said the University is now required to encapsulate the ceiling and "make sure" such an incident doesn't happen again. Last Wednesday, maintenance workers taped a sheet over the ceiling. Each time Pen begins a construction project, the University's environmental health office comes in and blocks off the area, Mosher said. "They have a pretty qualified staff there at the University," Siletsky said. "They have several certified industrial hygienists." Siletsky said the extensive library renovations occurring over students' heads -- which are set to be completed in August -- could, however, create a potential hazard. "If they're jackhammering on the second floor, and you've got an asbestos-containing material [in the] ceiling, then, sure, stuff is going to be flaking down." OSHA defines a hazardous amount of airborne asbestos as 0.15 fibers per cubic centimeter of air for an 8-hour exposure period, which Siletsky said is much higher than the amount to which students were exposed. "We don't think this was a life-threatening event," Mosher said. "We think it was serious and we took every effort to take care of it quickly and be sure nobody encounters any dangers." Blank said she'll stay away from the library in the future. "I'm graduating in May," she said. "And there's no way in hell that I'm going in there unless I have to."
(01/22/98 10:00am)
More than 100 students will not be able to retain their rooms next year due to the new college house program. Until this year, students living in the high rises were practically assured they would be able to retain their rooms as long as they attended the University. But next fall, many floors will lack familiar faces. As University officials try to find homes for freshmen and new residential programs in the high rises, occupants of about a dozen floors throughout the three buildings have been notified that they will not be able to retain their apartments next year. The Department of Academic Programs and Residence Life has told affected students that it will make an effort to find them identical apartments elsewhere in the high rises, APRL Director Chris Dennis said. As part of the new college house program, the University will reorganize its residences into 12 houses with enhanced programming. The new houses will feature additional faculty members and more living-learning programs. Significant numbers of freshmen will also move into the formerly upperclass dormitories for the first time. In order to accommodate these additional faculty members and students, more than 100 high rise residents will have to move next fall. The residents, who occupy the 10th and 11th floors in High Rise North, the seventh and eighth floors in High Rise East and the 11th and 12th floors in High Rise South, were notified by mail. Also, part of the the 23rd floor of each of the high rises will be turned into faculty housing. The 12th floor in HRN and the 14th floor in HRE will house living-learning programs. Current residents may keep their apartments on these floors, but only if they join the programs. Although no past participants of the Community Service Living-Learning Program -- which is being relocated from the Castle on 36th Street and Locust Walk -- have agreed to relocate to the high rises, residents of the 12th floor of HRN have already been told they will have to move to make room for the program. This will also be the case for residents of the 14th floor of HRE, where the new Ancient Studies/University Museum Residential Program will be housed starting in the fall. Since each college house will have a house dean, a faculty master and one or more faculty fellows living in the house -- in addition to several graduate associates and resident advisers -- apartments for the faculty members will be constructed in the 23rd floors of all three high rises. House deans will reside in the middle of the building, and the GAs will have apartments in those floors that do not have RAs. Apartments for both house deans and GAs will be converted from former student apartments. Two floors in each high rise have been designated as freshman housing. Half of the apartments on each of those floors will house freshmen. Upperclassmen in those rooms will also be forced to move out. Those floors will become part of the designated first-year clusters, integrating the freshmen with upperclassmen while allowing them to live close together, Dennis said. Although APRL promised to relocate the affected residents, many said they were upset that they were not given the option of retaining their apartments. College junior Dara Gruen, who lives in a four-bedroom apartment on the 12th floor of HRN, said she was "upset" with the short notice. "It was sort of a shock," she said. "They knew about this. They could have told us sooner in case we wanted to look off campus." And Andre Pontual, a College sophomore who lives on the 10th floor of HRS, said he was "disappointed" that the University took away an option that all other students have. Other students said they understood the need to find room for freshmen and new programs. One 10th-floor resident of HRN said she received a notification letter, adding that the situation is "understandable because freshmen need somewhere to live." Dennis insisted that APRL would do its best to find comparable housing for students who are forced to move. "We think that the relocations won't be all that disruptive for people choosing to retain," he said. And the letter students received from Eleanor Rupsis, the associate director of occupancy administration, said that her office will "try to assign you to the same type of room in your building, if available." Some students might, however, be assigned to "another building" if no other accommodation can be made, Dennis said. But Gruen was skeptical that APRL will be able to find her a four-bedroom apartment with the advantages of her current 12th-floor apartment, located in the middle of the building. She said she doesn't "want to be on the 24th floor nor the first floor."
(01/21/98 10:00am)
The Ancient Studies/University Museum program will be housed on the 14th floor of High Rise East. Students fascinated by ancient civilizations and museum work will be able to take their interests home with them this fall as a new residential program comes to life on the 14th floor of High Rise East. The Ancient Studies/University Museum Residential Program is the only completely new program to enter the high rises this fall in conjunction with the University's college house plan, which will reorganize all University residences into 12 houses with enhanced programming by next fall. When administrators released the plan in September, they emphasized the new system's ability to support a host of smaller specialized residential programs within the houses. Officials recently confirmed that the community service program, formerly housed in the Castle at 36th Street and Locust Walk, will move to the 12th floor of High Rise North. Both programs will likely displace any current residents who wish to retain their rooms on those floors but do not want to join the programs. Most residents of the 14th floor of HRE said they do not plan to remain on the floor regardless of the new program. Students participating in the Ancient Studies program would participate in trips to museums as well as a "whole range of formal and informal activities," according to Chris Dennis, director of Academic Programs and Residence Life. The Ancient Studies program was developed in tandem with the new, interdisciplinary Center for Ancient Studies and the Ancient Studies minor, which was finalized last fall. Until students begin the room selection process next month, it is difficult to estimate how many people will be interested in the program, which could house about 30 students on the floor. But administrators say that's not a problem. Art History Professor Holly Pittman, who created the program, said it is "open to anybody." If vacant rooms remain, housing officials will fill them through the lottery process. If the program has more applicants than spaces, it could expand to other floors. Pittman, a scholar of ancient Near Eastern art and a curator for the University Museum, said she was seeking a way to involve the Museum in academic programming in the College Houses. Students studying a broad range of subjects -- including anthropology, archaeology, art history, philosophy and classical studies -- may be especially interested in the program, Pittman said. Art History Professor David Brownlee, chairperson of the college house planning committee, said the program is being offered as an "open invitation" for students to mold it into what they want. "It's being advertised as an opportunity," Brownlee said. "It's like putting an advertisement in the newspaper to see if there's a group of people who'd like to form a barbershop quartet." Residents of the 14th floor of HRE who want to retain their apartment for next year can either join the Ancient Studies residential program or be guaranteed the same room type on another floor, Dennis said. The program will house a graduate associate, and several associate faculty members who live off-campus will be available to lend their time to the group. Pittman said at least three of her colleagues have expressed interest in joining her as associate faculty members of the program.
(01/19/98 10:00am)
The former church was destroyed by fire as it was being renovated into classroom and studio space. What was once a historic building is now just a doorway. The 114-year-old Asbury Methodist Episcopal Church at 33rd and Chestnut streets was demolished during winter break, ending any hopes the Fine Arts Department may have had of preserving the original building for use by its students. Rehabilitating the church from its present condition would have been "prohibitively expensive," according to Graduate School of Fine Arts Dean Gary Hack. The building was originally set to open in August 1997 as the $8.2 million Charles Addams Fine Arts Hall, named for the cartoonist who graduated from Penn in 1934 with a degree in Fine Arts. But efforts to renovate the church to provide much-needed studio, classroom and gallery space for undergraduate and graduate fine arts students were destroyed last March in a four-alarm blaze that caused structural damage to the back and side walls of the building. Since then, the building has stood untouched while University officials mulled over whether to rebuild the ruined structure or tear it down and start from scratch. In December, officials decided to demolish the church. It took nearly nine months to decide the building's fate because officials were waiting to settle claims with the insurance company responsible for the project, then-Associate Vice President for Facilities Management Omar Blaik said last month. The University had initially claimed a larger amount than the insurance company was willing to pay for the fire damage, he said. At the time, Penn officials estimated that the fire caused about $3.5 million of damage. According to Hack, the insurance settlement left the University with only a small fraction of the money needed for another building project. Officials refused to disclose the exact amount of the settlement. The demolition leaves GSFA with another problem: designing a new building that satisfies the donor, Addams' widow Lady Barbara Colyton. She wanted the church preserved. Duplicating the church's prior appearance would have involved taking apart the remaining walls stone by stone, finding a quarry where additional stones of that same color could be retrieved, then rebuilding the entire structure, according to Hack. "If it were a great cultural monument you would do that," Hack said. "This was a rather ordinary church, not worth spending enormous amounts of money to restore." The demolition process itself took almost two weeks, leaving nothing of the building but its entranceway. Hack said the original stones from the entrance will be taken down carefully and preserved. The Fine Arts Department is currently looking at several options for creating more space. Addams Hall would have only accounted for half the space the department still needs. Providing space for the department's entire needs would cost between $20 million and $30 million, he added. Hack said the department plans to retain the Blauhaus building, a blue shed at 33rd and Chestnut streets, for studio space and workshops even after it finds a new home.
