Welcome Back From the President |
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August 25, 2015, Volume 62, No. 02 |
At Home in the World
A warm welcome back to all as we begin Penn’s 276th year! This will be a year of new ventures and new levels of engagement across the globe, bookended by important events early in the fall and later in the spring semesters.
At the start of the fall semester, I will join alumni and many of Penn’s deans and senior leaders in Beijing for a very special presentation of the 2015 David M. and Lyn Silfen University Forum. Our discussion will focus on the role of China and the United States in shaping political, economic, technological and social developments in the 21st century. The Silfen Forum will be the culminating event of the “First 100 Days” celebrations that began in March, marking the launch of the Penn Wharton China Center in Beijing.
The members of the Silfen Forum panel who will explore the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead for the United States and China are notable for their breadth of expertise and depth of experience: Former United States Secretary of State General Colin Powell, USA (Ret.); Former Minister of Foreign Affairs for the PRC Ambassador Li Zhaoxing; CEO and Co-Founder of SOHO China LTD Zhang Xin; and Co-Chairman of Oaktree Capital Management LLC Howard Marks, W’67. Of particular interest for everyone are the ways in which higher education can foster understanding, cooperation and trust between nations oftentimes perceived as at far remove—even at odds—in their cultural perspectives and politics.
Penn has a century of history in China and nearly 10,000 alumni currently living in Asia, many of whom live and work in the major cities of Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong. Locating the 2015 Silfen Forum in Beijing provides a unique opportunity to celebrate Penn in China. But even more, the Forum offers a timely opportunity to consider how the paired engines of cooperation and competition will define the China-U.S. relationship in areas as far ranging as business, technology, finance, climate change and health care, arts and culture, and higher education for decades to come. One important question I will pose is how, looking ahead, we can best foster creativity and innovation for the betterment of humankind both within each of our great countries and also between them. In addition to the Silfen Forum, we will host many School events at the Penn Wharton China Center, focusing on everything from the future of robotics, to advances in medicine and healthcare, to the role of design in China and more. These events aim to expand and deepen connections that already exist between Penn and Asia to bring about increased levels of interaction and cooperation.
At the same time as we are forging new Penn connections in Asia, we are building a new home at the heart of Penn’s campus—on Locust Walk and 38th Street—that will link our faculty and students to programs and activities across the globe. Perry World House is scheduled to open before the end of spring semester 2016, and I look forward to inaugurating it as an international hub for Penn’s global activities. A meeting place for faculty, students, visiting scholars and dignitaries to discuss and deliberate issues of international concern, Perry World House’s Global Innovations Institute will marshal interdisciplinary research and generate new insight into global challenges. Even before construction is completed, it has been engaged in supporting Penn global initiatives, hosting international gatherings and welcoming noteworthy speakers to campus as part of its mission to help bring Penn to the world and the world to Penn. Perry World House will serve to unite the focus of Penn’s people and programs engaging with the global community; as the center itself so aptly describes its mission, it will be “a catalyst, a connector and a communicator for international research, teaching and engagement.”
Although these important mileposts in the academic year ahead of us will occur half a world apart, Penn’s engagement in China and Perry World House are in fact different expressions of one and the same vision. The core of the University of Pennsylvania is an outward-looking community of students and scholars determined to acquire understanding, promote new knowledge and make important discoveries for the benefit of societies, communities and individuals all across the globe. This year we mark two undertakings that will serve to advance our efforts enormously while underscoring Penn’s unwavering commitment to global engagement. We are out front, looking ahead. That’s Penn’s place in the world and what the world, increasingly, expects from Penn.
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