For its commitment to service learning in the past year, Penn has received a Presidential Award of the 2012 President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll. Penn was one of five higher education institutions to receive the Presidential Award. The five awards were granted out of 14 finalists, and 513 were admitted to the honor roll.

The voter identification bill that passed in the Pennsylvania Senate last week is drawing heated debate among policy makers and voters. The Senate passed a bill on Mar. 7 requiring voters to present valid photo ID at the polls to be eligible to vote. HB 934 passed by a margin of 26 to 23.

The UPenn Space, Mobile, and Autonomous Robotics Team is preparing to blast off into a National Aeronautics and Space Administration-sponsored competition in June. Founded last year, the team — which consists of 30 members — has received support from Penn’s globally recognized General Robotics, Automatic Sensing and Perception Lab.

Last April, more than 200 students and faculty members participated in a silent protest against racism on College Green. The protest was triggered by a Daily Pennsylvanian guest column in which then-College of Liberal and Professional Studies student Christopher Abreu, described an encounter with racism on Penn’s campus.

With the College topping the charts in course-size enrollment again this year, professors of large classes are finding new ways to engage students. College Dean Dennis DeTurck noted that some of the highest enrolled courses have made distinctive changes to their overall nature this year.

Two graduate students at Penn are looking to use their interest in medicine to improve eye care in Liberia through the New Sight Eye Center. The center began operating a few weeks ago in Liberia with the mission of reducing preventable blindness and visual impairment in rural and urban communities.

Philadelphia police fired gunshots in the area of 38th and Market streets early Thursday morning, and Penn’s Department of Public Safety issued a UPennAlert at 3:17 a.m.

The appointment of Christina Paxson will maintain the current balance of male-to-female Ivy League presidents.

Students, faculty and staff at Penn — as well as from schools across Philadelphia — walked out of their classrooms Thursday for the National Day of Action for Education, joining together in solidarity for a march to City Hall. GALLERY: Education WalkoutVIDEO: March for Education Reform

Last Saturday, Penn Dems announced that College junior Andrew Silverstein resigned from his position as president. College sophomore Andrew Brown will assume the position, effective immediately, in leading the student group for the next year.

Each trip has a different project on a different site, but all of them share the same basic structure: groups of 12-14 travel somewhere in the country and engage in community service.

The coding and startup community at Penn has been steadily growing in recent years.

The Division of Public Safety recently concluded an investigation of a reported swastika engraving on campus.

Before arriving at Penn, 22-year-old College freshman John Cheo was somewhere in the middle of Brunei’s jungles on a survival expedition, living off whatever he could scavenge from the area while fulfilling Singapore’s military obligations.

The Penn Project for Civic Engagement has teamed with the region’s chapter of a national service organization, to host community forums.

During the break, Wharton Dean Thomas Robertson will visit Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and Buenos Aires, Argentina, as part of his plan to meet with alumni and other influential people associated with Wharton.

Freedom to Marry Day is celebrated all over the nation and involves symbolically marrying student couples throughout the day. It is organized by National Marriage Equality USA, a grass roots nonprofit organization.