Cassandra Tognoni

'Let's just calculate the discount rate and then we can dance." My Advanced Corporate Finance group minimizes the Excel worksheet and lets loose. It's 2 a.m. in Huntsman and passersby stare. (Yes, it is weird that we're breaking it down in a study room, but it's also weird that you're 19 and pretend you're Gordon Gekko.

'Ok, people, we're going live, with simulated ammunition." So started my gun safety lesson last Wednesday at Philadelphia Archery & Gun Club in Southeast Philly. After last weeks's tragic crime, I was searching for anything that would make me feel safer on an increasingly dangerous campus.

All whites are racist. At least that's the message that a recently discontinued University of Delaware residential-hall program had disseminated to over 7,000 of its students. As part of a "diversity training" program that students participated in during orientation, freshmen attended training sessions, floor meetings and one-on-one meetings with their Resident Assistants.

As the presidential race heats up, education reform is a hot topic. Okay, maybe not as hot as last week's Halloween costumes, but next November's winner - and the education policies he or she pursues - will undoubtedly have repercussions for those of us Quakers who will still be around come January 2009.

On Saturday, they were everywhere: sexy referees, sexy gladiators, sexy cats. It's Halloween, and that means discovering that just about any occupation and any animal can be made into tight, cleavage-baring, upper-thigh-revealing ensemble that oozes sexuality.

Brown kids are hippy pot smokers, Columbia kids are artsy and deep, Harvard kids are arrogant pricks, but what are Penn kids? Are we even important enough to garner any sort of stereotype, whether negative or positive? I visited four other colleges (Drexel, Brown, Yale and Princeton) to find out.

Now that it's On Campus Recruiting season, I think it is safe to say that most of the senior class is freaking out. Because one bad interview, one bombed brainteaser, and you know you've blown your chance at future happiness. But don't fret, dear senior, you haven't.

Harvard starts classes today. Correction, my friend tells, me; they start "shopping." I have always been jealous of other Ivies' shopping periods. The whole concept sounds so free and fun. Students can register for as many classes as they want and then pick the ones they like best.

As I happily returned to Penn last week, I was not-so-happily faced with the realization that "going out" requires a little more caution than I'm used to back in suburbia. All of us girls returning to Penn must now remember to congregate in groups when walking home at night.