A new report predicts that starting salaries for associates at top Manhattan law firms could reach $190,000 by December, and one expert says they have no signs of stopping. The 2007 Salary Guide - published by Robert Half Legal, a recruitment firm based in Menlo Park, Calif.

Prize-winning poet Susan Howe appeared at the Kelly Writer's house yesterday for an exclusive poetry reading of her own works. An author of several poetry publications, Howe opened the night with one of her most recent prose poems, "What is this Crackling of Voices in the Mind," in a style she described as "a Jonathan Edwards personal, conversion narrative.

Community activists are convinced that, if the city has its way, $50 million of their hard earned tax money will go to one ugly bridge. But at a public hearing yesterday, they learned that if construction doesn't start soon, it may never happen. The City Council's Committee on Streets and Services convened the hearing to debate a proposal to widen South Street.

In the world of prestigious scholarships, Penn is back in the game. As of last Sunday, Alix Rogers is representing Penn as the University's only winner of the Gates Cambridge Scholarship, which grants recipients one year of study and research at the University of Cambridge in England.

The gifts for Barbaro just keep on coming. The Penn School of Veterinary Medicine announced yesterday that Barbaro's owners, Roy and Gretchen Jackson, donated a $3 million gift to Penn Vet to fund research on laminitis and other equine diseases. The money will supplement gifts from the Fund to Fight Laminitis that have been donated to sponsor this future research.

Slick sidewalks, lots of slush and furious winds won't get in the way of Cupid's bow, at least as far as students are concerned.

The number of spots available at some of the top business schools in the country is dropping - but not at Wharton. The Yale School of Management is planning for an incoming class of 195, compared to its 220-person class of 2008, and Stanford's Graduate School of Business is also aiming to scale back its class size by 20.

On a busy night of studying, Mustafa Al-ammar was chatting on instant messenger. But the College junior was not procrastinating or making plans to go to a frat party: He was chatting about an upcoming assignment with a professor. "I never go to office hours," Al-ammar said.

Sometimes, all it takes is a little chardonnay to get a neighborhood back on track. Part of a larger revitalization of the area, demolition is set to begin on the current over-the-counter liquor store on the 4900 block of Baltimore Ave., which will be moved down the block and will re-open in late spring.

Joseph Cho, the second-year Law student who allegedly tried to kill his downstairs neighbors, had enrolled at the New York University School of Law for several weeks in 2000 but left for reasons that the school would not disclose. Penn Law officials knew about the previous enrollment prior to Cho's acceptance at Penn, but they remain unaware of his cause for leave, Penn Law School Dean for Student Affairs Gary Clinton said yesterday.

When it comes to global warming, Earth sciences professor Robert Giegengack gets heated up about people playing politics. So, while Al Gore's film on the subject, An Inconvenient Truth, has garnered the former vice president praise and a recent nomination for the Nobel Prize, Giegengack isn't so enthused.

"People of the world, it's time to get paid." So reads the motto for the International Coalition for British Reparations, founded by Philadelphia advertising executive Steven Grasse. Claiming that Britain is responsible for all the world's troubles, the ICBR wants the British government to pay reparations equaling a total of $58 trillion to be distributed equally to every man, woman and child on earth - except, of course, the British.

Theft Feb. 6 - A student reported that his parked car at Garage 40 on 40th Street was broken into when he returned to the vehicle at about 5:30 p.m. after several days away. Feb. 6 - A student reported that an unknown person took his wallet, of unknown value, which was left unsecured on a desk in Van Pelt Library at about noon.

It was a University of Pennsylvania woman who made the first major stride for women presidents in academia, and now another Penn woman is making the next one. Former Penn President Judith Rodin made history as the first female president of an Ivy League school, and, with the appointment of Drew Faust as Harvard's first female president last Sunday, professors, administrators and professionals are heralding her appointment as the next big step for women.

By Jody Pollock Contributing Writer gamail@dailypennsylvanian.com In San Francisco, it broke the HIV/AIDS story. In Houston, it could have prevented the Enron scandal. And in Minot, N.D., it could have saved lives. Local news, explained Eric Klinenberg, the guest speaker at last night's 2007 Dean's Lecture at Annenberg, is the fabric that ties our nation together - but that fabric is being unraveled as major media conglomerates claim control over increasingly unregulated airwaves, sapping the country of its local flavors.

Many Wharton graduates go into i-banking. Others hope to make their fortune from the stock market. But one Wharton senior is looking to make money from the most basic principle of business: Wear a good suit. Alex Avendano started a custom-suit company called Henry Davidsen, and this recruiting season, he's hoping almost every Wharton undergraduate will be wearing one of his pieces.

The doorbell was set to the tune of the Star Spangled Banner. As it rang through the whole house, the fraternity brothers stopped for a moment, grinning. "Listen to that!" Engineering sophomore Alex Numann said. "We're hearing America," College junior Matt Fiedler exclaimed.