In keeping with his initiative to reduce the crime rates in Philadelphia, Mayor Michael Nutter appointed Charles Ramsey as the city's new Police Commissioner. Vice President for Public Safety Maureen Rush says that she believes that "Commissioner Ramsey will be making a big difference in the Philadelphia Police Department and the City of Philadelphia.

Though law-school applications are down recently, for some groups of applicants, the decline has more constant. Minority enrollment has decreased in the past decade. First-year enrollments of African American and Mexican American students dropped from 3,937 in 1992 to 3,595 in 2005, according to a recent Columbia Law School study.

Professor Modi has arrived on campus. For this semester only, Kalpen Modi - more popularly known as Kal Penn - is an adjunct professor in the Asian American Studies Department, teaching ASAM 109: Asian Americans in the Media.

This Saturday, the 124th Board of Editors and Managers will be inaugurated at the DP's annual banquet.

Though criminal self-disclosure has been championed as a step toward improving campus safety without an obtrusive criminal background check, its effectiveness remains in question.

The Hub, the colorful apartment and retail building on the corner of 40th and Chestnut streets, will soon be expanding across the street. Teres Holdings, LLC, the developer behind The Hub, is currently planning the construction of Hub II, which will be built on the other side of 40th Street, at 4001 Chestnut St.

White Dog or Whole Foods? Local or organic? As students begin to rack their brains to find alternative food options, Penn Dining has responded, making a slow but concerted effort toward sustainable dining. Dining Services general manager John Cipollini attributed the recent student and staff interest in food quality to the diatribe against our eating culture found in The Omnivore's Dilemma, the Penn Reading Project book for the class of 2011.

Penn's admissions office is changing how prospective students can apply to the University. For the 2008-2009 admissions cycle, Penn is eliminating its own application and adding the Universal College Application as an option for students. Applicants will be able to use either the UCA or the Common Application, the latter of which the University first accepted last year.

Pennsylvania Governor Ed Rendell announced his support for Senator Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign yesterday in a news conference at City Hall. Clinton, a Democrat from New York, made a last-minute trip to Philadelphia to speak at the event. Rendell was also joined by Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter, who had already announced his endorsement of Clinton.

The appointment of Eric Furda as dean of admissions last week came faster than Penn President Amy Gutmann had predicted, and also marked a deviation from industry standards. From the search committee's first meeting in October to the announcement of Furda as the new dean last week, Penn's formal search process took just over three months, a pace experts say is fast but not unheard of.

The United Minorities Council elected College and Wharton junior Lisa Zhu, who is also a DP columnist, as its new chair at the Greenfield Intercultural Center yesterday evening. The DP met with Zhu after the election to talk about her plans for the council.

5,151 is a big number. When translated into meals, it is enough to feed roughly half of the undergraduate class. It is also enough to feed an extra 5,151 hungry mouths.

If Greek architecture is a riddle, producers of PBS' NOVA series think one Penn professor might have cracked it. That's the reason, they say, for featuring Art History professor Lothar Haselberger as a primary expert in their "Secrets of the Parthenon" special, premiering Jan.

Last Friday, members of the Service Employees International Union and their supporters gathered to protest a speech by David Rubenstein, co-founder of the private equity firm, the Carlyle Group. Rubenstein was a keynote speaker at Wharton's 14th annual private equity and venture capital conference.

The Recording Industry Association of America sent another wave of pre-litigation letters to colleges earlier this month, though Penn did not receive any letters in this round. The RIAA sent 407 pre-litigation settlement letters to students at 18 universities nationwide, continuing its strategy of primarily targeting college students.

For Soniya, age 11, interacting with the police is all about cheerleading and homework. At the Police Athletic League's after-school program, Soniya practices her cheerleading and does her homework with around 60 other kids who participate. The Tucker PAL Center, where Soniya spends her afternoons, is located in the Alexander Wilson School on 46th Street and Woodland and is one of the 27 branches of the Philadelphia Police Athletic League.