The overall growth of applications from international graduate students has steadily declined over the last three years, according to a report released April 18 by the Council of Graduate Schools. Despite overall national decrease, 62 percent of the schools surveyed - including Penn - reported an average increase of 9 percent.

While many Penn students juggle academics, extracurricular activities and a social life, there is still one thing left for many to learn to balance - a checkbook. With the importance of financial literacy - knowledge of how to manage a credit-card to how to create a budget, for example - growing each and every year, trend-setting colleges all over the nation are reaching out to their students and expanding the financial advising resources available to them.

Sen. Hillary Clinton's victory in the Pennsylvania primary election last night came as little surprise to many on campus. Still, supporters of her opponent, Sen. Barack Obama, said they don't feel defeated. In fact, many said they anticipate that Obama will still win the Democratic presidential nomination and expressed plans to campaign for Obama leading up to next month's primaries in Indiana and North Carolina.

Trailing first-place Columbia by 4.5 games with five Ivy contests to go, Penn knows that this weekend's two doubleheaders against the Lions represent the team's final chance to repeat as Gehrig Division champs. "Season's not over," coach John Cole said. "We've got to put together a good week here and hopefully make a run.

It may have slipped under the radar, what with all the election news dominating the headlines - but at a little school to the north of here, a very different sort of controversy has been brewing. My friends at Yale haven't been talking Barack vs. Hillary.

Professor Dan Bogen loves children's toys - designing them, that is. Bogen, an associate professor of Bioengineering since 1982, started a program called PennToys as a project for his Bioengineering Senior Design students. For more than 14 years, students involved with PennToys have designed devices so medical researches and therapists can use them to help diagnose and treat disabled children.

Penn is helping Philadelphia's top officials to become better leaders. Two weeks ago, Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter's senior administrators assembled at the Steinberg Conference Center on Thursday and Friday to participate in the University's executive education program, a two-day institute program to develop leadership and management skills.

Jason Pinsky's team is 3-4 in the Ivy League. A losing record, for a change. But he was in the mood for introspection. "I've been doing this for three years now. That's what I've based my whole career on - being solid, winning matches. Creating a legacy, which I feel I've done.

COLLEGE PARK, MD. - You can't score if you don't shoot. Or, in the case of the men's lacrosse team, you can't score even if you do shoot. The Quakers followed up terrible shooting performances against Princeton and Brown with another one at Maryland. They lost all three games by a combined 31-14 score.

The Ivy League as a whole is moving toward gender-neutral housing with Yale University's recent consideration of the policy. Penn has offered gender-neutral housing since fall 2005, after a gay male student who wanted to live with his female best friend raised the issue.

The chants at Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton's rally at the Palestra last night were not all that different from those at Barack Obama's Philadelphia rally last Friday. But instead of saying "Yes We Can," the crowd in the stands cheered, "Yes She Can.

Although nearly two-thirds of Penn students are registered to vote in Pennsylvania, members of the third who won't go to the polls today say they don't mind the political frenzy that has overtaken the state over the last seven weeks. "It's actually really exhilarating," said College freshman Jenna Stahl, who voted in Ohio's Democratic primary.

If the thousands of students at Sen. Barack Obama's Philadelphia rally last Friday - and the thousands that came to the Palestra last night for Hillary Clinton's rally - are any indication, this year's primaries have seen a dramatic rise in youth involvement.

An area caffeine staple will close its doors next month after more than 13 years on campus. Bucks County Coffee, located between 34th and 36th streets along Sansom Street will close on May 23. The store is one of three Buck's County Coffee shops in University City, along with a store at 40th and Locust streets and a kiosk at 30th Street Station.

Next week will mark an important milestone in minority student groups' continued push toward a comprehensive assessment of campus climate at Penn. Campus climate - which refers to individuals' levels of comfort at Penn in terms of their gender and gender identity, race, sexual orientation, religion and ethnicity - has been an important issue for minority student groups for at least the past 10 years.

As many Penn students finalize term papers, child-rearing issues may seem far from their concerns. However, a large turnout of students from Penn Nursing, including future midwives, maternity researchers and other advocates, were all eager last night to discuss the child-birthing process, as well as social challenges and changes in maternity care.

A poor endorsement To the Editor: While I understand that the editorial board is free to endorse whom it wants, I was disappointed to see its endorsement of Senator Hillary Clinton go without a serious examination of her record. For example, the editorial noted Clinton "helped to expand children's health insurance.