Jeremy Baron

For most Penn students, spending 15 minutes to get to and from class is pushing it. But last semester, Swarthmore junior Sven David Udekwu measured his commute in hours, not minutes. Waking up at about 9 a.m., catching a 9:10 bus to Penn and arriving almost half an hour before his 10 a.

Ellen Robb was brutally beaten to death last December after years of a rocky marriage. Now, her relatives have formed a foundation to help other troubled women. Former Economics professor Rafael Robb pleaded guilty Monday to voluntary manslaughter, admitting that he killed his wife, Ellen Robb, in the couple's Upper Merion home by bludgeoning her with a chin-up bar after an argument.

WILMINGTON, Del. - After eight days of deliberations, the jury still has yet to render a verdict on the first-degree murder charges against Irina Malinovskaya. Malinovskaya, a Wharton student, allegedly bludgeoned to death her ex-boyfriend Robert Bondar's girlfriend, Temple University student Irina Zlotnikov, at Bondar's New Castle, Del.

Oh, the woes of a local burger aficionado. Near Penn, choices are slim for that most quintessential of American meals: On the one hand, beefy checks and relatively long waits are the norm at the Marathon Grills or Copabananas of campus, while on the other hand - McDonalds.

University President Amy Gutmann, Provost Ron Daniels, faculty and student leaders met yesterday afternoon in Bodek Lounge for the year's second meeting of the University Council. The UC discussed issues relating to Penn's recently announced $3.5 billion capital campaign, PennConnects and the PennAlert security-notification system.

The school year has barely started, but the Recording Industry Association of America hasn't wasted any time continuing its legal onslaught against students.

Penn clocks in at No. 5 in the U.S. News & World Report's 2008 rankings of national universities, released today online. The position, for which the University is tied with the California Institute of Technology, marks a slight improvement from last year's standing at No.

The words "summer school" don't have much of a ring to them. Hard for them to, since they conjure up images of miscreant children making up for the cumulative effects of failed English papers about, say, To Kill a Mockingbird.

The advertisements for Product Red are nothing else if not striking. A faded blood-red background plays host to messages printed in broken black block font: "As first world consumers, we have tremendous power. What we collectively choose to buy, or not to buy, can change the course of life and history on this planet," one such ad reads.

The Penn students currently on campus probably have some idea of what this summer has in store. But for everyone else - those here on campus for the first time taking summer session courses, doing internships or working (and, of course, the eventual throngs of high schoolers who will crowd campus come late June) - the City of Brotherly Love could seem a little intimidating.