August 11, 2020 Volume 67 Issue 5

The National Science Foundation, through a five-year, $26 million grant, has established the NSF Engineering Research Center for the Internet of Things for Precision Agriculture (IoT4Ag), headquartered at the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Engineering and Applied Science.

Engineering Research Centers (ERCs) are NSF’s flagship engineering program for convergent research to address large-scale societal challenges. The IoT4Ag Center aims to address food, energy, and water security through advanced agricultural technologies.

Starting in the soil and reaching into the digital cloud, these technologies will collect, share, and analyze data in order to improve farming practices, maximizing a farm’s productivity while minimizing its waste and ecological impact.

Researchers in Penn Engineering’s GRASP Lab have long been developing swarms of flying robots, which could be equipped to autonomously fly through orchards, counting fruit and assessing tree health, among other applications.

Center researchers will create miniature soil-based sensors and swarms of aerial and ground-based robots, as well as new ways of networking them together in communication-constrained environments. The researchers will also develop high-level data science techniques that will allow data from different sensors in the field to be integrated with data from weather reports and commodity markets, synthesizing it into actionable information.

Part of the ERC mandate is to converge a wide range of academic disciplines in tackling these challenges; another is to develop a diverse and inclusive workforce from across the United States. By partnering with industry and a broad community of students, faculty and professionals, the IoT4Ag Center will create an innovation ecosystem to continue these efforts into the coming decades.

Cherie Kagan, Stephen J. Angello Professor in Penn Engineering’s departments of electrical and systems engineering and materials science and engineering, is the IoT4Ag Center’s director and principal investigator. She will lead a team of more than two dozen researchers across Penn Engineering, Purdue University, University of California Merced, and the University of Florida.

“We need new technology to meet the challenges of a world with a growing population and changing climate,” Dr. Kagan said. “We simply need to produce more crops for every drop of water or Joule of energy we’re currently using to realize a food, energy and water-secure future.”

The IoT4Ag Center is divided into three integrated thrusts, with teams of researchers working on sensing, communication/energy, and response technologies.

Members of the Agricultural Sensor Systems team will develop miniature sensors designed to be planted alongside crops or placed on top of the soil. These sensors will be considerably less expensive than current systems for monitoring micronutrients and other soil conditions but be sowed like seeds and even provide data on the scale of an individual plant. They will also develop fleets of robots that will gather data from the air or ground; autonomously monitoring the health of plants with a suite of data-rich sensors, predicting crop yield and quality of produce.

Forming a network out of this diverse suite of sensors presents its own challenges, especially in the unique environment of a farm. Signals will need to travel from below the soil surface, to farm equipment, and from there to the cloud, and do so over long distances in remote locations with no pre-existing cellular networks to rely upon. Members of the Communication and Energy Systems team will develop methods for establishing and maintaining these lines of communication, along with energy technologies to keep sensors and robots running with minimal human interaction.

Finally, members of the Agricultural Response Systems team will develop models that will integrate data from a farm’s network of sensors with that from the wider world. By providing situational awareness informed by plant physiology, weather patterns, socioeconomic trends and evolving agricultural techniques, farmers will be able to implement measures targeted at the performance of individual crops.

Collectively, the IoT4Ag Center will also create a diverse talent pipeline consisting of K-12 and university students, engineers, agriculture professionals and other members of farming communities through audience-specific lessons and hands-on classroom, laboratory and field activities. Bringing together academic, government and industry partners with the farming community, the Center will create an innovation ecosystem that ensures the rapid translation of IoT4Ag practices and technologies into commercial products, and will also ensure that such a transformation is built with sustainable positive economic and social impact in mind.

“For the last 35 years, engineering research centers have helped shape science and technology in the United States by fostering innovation and collaboration among industry, universities and government agencies,“ said NSF Director Sethuraman Panchanathan. “As we kick off a new generation of centers, NSF will continue to work with its partners to ensure the success of these collaborative enterprises and the transformative, convergent research impact they produce.”

Amy Stornaiuolo, associate professor in the literacy, culture, and international education division of Penn GSE, has been awarded $2.49 million from the McDonnell Foundation for her project, “Facilitating Digital Discourse: Teachers as Learners in a Digital Age.” In the project, Dr. Stornaiuolo and her team will examine how secondary English teachers learn to facilitate digital discourse in their classrooms, specifically focusing on online discussions.

Dr. Stornaiuolo will work with Penn GSE’s Ebony Elizabeth Thomas as well as colleagues at the National Writing Project, the Philadelphia Writing Project, the Denver Writing Project, the Institute of Cognitive Science, and Stanford University to execute the research.

André Dombrowski, associate professor of the history of art, has been appointed Frances Shapiro-Weitzenhoffer Associate Professor of 19th Century European Art. Dr. Dombrowski is a highly esteemed scholar of art and material culture in late 19th-century France and Germany. In addition to his first book, Cézanne, Murder, and Modern Life, which won the Phillips Collection Book Prize from the University of Maryland, he has edited and co-edited a number of important volumes, including Is Paris Still the Capital of the Nineteenth Century? Essays on Art and Modernity, 1850-1900, and the forthcoming Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Impressionism. His second book, Monet’s Minutes: Impressionism and the Industrialization of Time, is in progress. At Penn, he has served as undergraduate chair of his department, as a member of the School’s Diversity Council and the University’s Graduate Council of the Faculties, as convener of the LGBTQ faculty diversity working group, and as a 2018-2020 Penn Fellow.

The Frances Shapiro-Weitzenhoffer Professorship of 19th Century European Art was established in 1992 by the late David Shapiro (GM’47) in memory of his daughter, Frances Shapiro-Weitzenhoffer (C’65). Mr. Shapiro-Weitzenhoffer was a distinguished art historian, editor, and specialist in Impressionist painting.

Justin McDaniel, professor of religious studies, has been named Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Term Professor of Religious Studies. Dr. McDaniel studies Southeast Asian religion and history, with particular emphases on Lao, Thai, Pali, and Sanskrit literature, art and architecture, and manuscript studies. He is the author of three books: Gathering Leaves and Lifting Words, which won the Harry J. Benda Prize of the Association for Asian Studies (AAS); The Lovelorn Ghost and the Magic Monk, which won the AAS Kahin Prize, and The Architects of Buddhist Leisure. His research has received support from the National Endowment for the Humanities; the Mellon, Rockefeller, Fulbright, and Luce foundations; PACRIM; the Social Science Research Council; and others. He has won teaching and advising awards at Harvard, Ohio University, and the University of California, and is a recipient of the Ludwig Prize for Teaching at Penn. Dr. McDaniel’s forthcoming work includes two books to be published next year, Embodied Manuscripts: Treasures from the Fogg Collections, and the first volume of Ornaments and Texts: Studies in Thai Buddhism.

The Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Endowed Term Chairs were established through a bequest by Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn. Edmund Kahn was a 1925 Wharton graduate who had a highly successful career in the oil and natural gas industry. Louise Kahn, a graduate of Smith College, worked for Newsweek and owned an interior design firm. They supported many programs and projects at Penn, including Van Pelt Library, the Modern Languages College House, and other initiatives in scholarship and the humanities.

Overview

Founded in 2004, the Penn Association of Senior and Emeritus Faculty (PASEF) organizes programs and activities for its members and encourages them to be active in the intellectual and social life of the University, and to provide service to the University and the community. PASEF members are senior (age 55 and above) and retired standing faculty at Penn. Current membership numbers 1,116 senior faculty and 585 emeritus faculty.  PASEF provides information and assistance to aid faculty in transitioning to retirement and organizes intellectual and social events such as lectures, excursions to cultural attractions, and attendance at theater, opera, and orchestra presentations. It is a member organization of AROHE, the Association of Retirement Organizations in Higher Education. The Association of Senior and Emeritus Faculty (ASEF–PSOM) is an analogous organization at the Perelman School of Medicine; its senior and emeritus faculty are also PASEF members. The two organizations regularly cooperate in planning joint programs and activities. The redesigned PASEF website, launched in July 2019, is provost.upenn.edu/pasef/

Administration

Governance and administration. PASEF operates under a set of bylaws and is governed by a Council which meets monthly during the academic year. The President, President-Elect, and Past President form the Steering Committee. Council members for 2019–2020 are listed in the Appendix.  PASEF receives an annual budget from the Provost and reports to the Vice Provost for Faculty. Anita Allen was Vice Provost for Faculty during 2013–2020 and Laura Perna assumed the position in July.

Facilities and support. PASEF has an office and an adjacent room used as a lounge on the first floor of Duhring Wing, next to the office of the Faculty Senate. Both the office and the adjacent lounge can accommodate meetings of small groups. Staff support is provided by Sarah Barr, PASEF’s full-time Coordinator. During the past year able assistance has also been given by members of the Provost’s staff, including Jillian Powell, Kathy Swartz, Jessie Burns, and Lynne Hunter.

Retirement

PASEF provides resources and gives presentations to aid senior faculty in planning the transition to retirement.

Road to Retirement programs. Panel discussions with PASEF members addressing retirement were held in November and early March. The topics were Exploring Living Options in Retirement and Negotiating the Retirement Transitions—What’s Next? Both presentations are available at the PASEF website. The annual presentation by Hilary Lopez and Vicki Mulhern, University staff experts on retirement options and retiree benefits, scheduled for April, had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Retirement planning. The 13th edition of PASEF’s publication Hitchhiker’s Guide to Faculty Retirement, under the editorship of Martin Pring and Janet Deatrick, was published in January. Sections on financial planning for retirement, transition to emeritus status, and retiree relations with the University are included, and the publication is available on the PASEF and ASEF–PSOM websites (the latter is www.med.upenn.edu/asef/). Both websites also house a guide to continuing care retirement communities (CCRCs) in the Philadelphia area. Sixteen such communities are featured, each with detailed information about cost, types of housing, medical support, and amenities. The guide also provides details about the different types of CCRCs, and links to information about them from the Pennsylvania and New Jersey state governments, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, and CARF International, the sole accreditor of CCRCs. In addition, PASEF regularly alerts members about new developments concerning retirement, suspension of required minimum distributions from retirement accounts during 2020, as specified by the CARES Act, being a recent example.

Reception for newly emeritus faculty. Recently between 50 and 60 standing faculty have taken emeritus status each year, and PASEF and ASEF–PSOM have co-sponsored an annual reception to honor the retirees. The in-person reception planned for May 2020 had to be cancelled. It has been rescheduled as a virtual reception in September, to honor the 72 faculty who are 2019–2020 retirees.

Activities and Events

Lectures. PASEF sponsors lectures throughout the academic year.  These are open to all members of the University community and span a wide range of topics which are of general interest. Normally, there are monthly luncheon lectures at the University Club and featured Fall and Spring lectures. During the Fall semester luncheon lectures were presented by Professor of Sociology Jerry Jacobs and author Julien Suaudeau. The Fall Lecture, given each year in October in conjunction with the 25-Year Club Dinner, was presented by Professor of Political Science Avery Goldstein on U.S.–China Relations in the Current Era. A link to the presentations is on the PASEF website. Lectures planned for the Spring semester had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Looking ahead, PASEF will be presenting virtual lectures for the foreseeable future. This will have the advantage of allowing participation by persons who are unable to attend, including those who are located outside the Philadelphia area. Presentation of in-person lectures has been greatly facilitated by the purchase of new equipment funded by the Office of the Provost.

Fall outing. Each year PASEF and ASEF–PSOM jointly plan Fall and Spring outings to locations of cultural or historical interest in the Philadelphia area. In November members went to the Ruth Bader Ginsburg exhibit at the National Museum of American Jewish History.

Theater and orchestra attendance. The Membership Committee, chaired by Anita Summers, has during the past two years arranged attendance at open rehearsals of the Philadelphia Orchestra. The Committee has also arranged theater outings. In October members attended a performance of Ragtime at the Arden Theater. Two more theater outings scheduled for March and April had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, PASEF is working with Opera Philadelphia for the presentation of virtual events for the membership, and plans to initiate outings to attend live opera performances when they resume.

Speakers Bureau. With encouragement and funding from Vice Provost Allen, PASEF launched its Speakers Bureau in the spring of 2016. This work was spearheaded by Jack Nagel as chair of the Speakers Bureau Committee. The Bureau enables community groups, including retirement communities, civic, social, and religious organizations, and high schools, to identify and invite PASEF members to speak to audiences in the Philadelphia area. The current roster of speakers numbers 31 and includes both senior and retired Penn faculty from Schools across the University. Information about the Bureau and the speakers and their topics is on the PASEF website.

Task Force Planning

With support from then-Vice Provost Anita Allen, PASEF convened a retreat at the end of AY2019 for the PASEF Council to review current operations.  The discussion was facilitated by Fernando Chang-Muy from the Law School. Stemming from the retreat, task forces were subsequently formed to study the issues raised and to make recommendations to the Council.  By the close of AY2020, three of the four task forces had completed their work and reported to Council, which voted acceptance of the recommendations. Work of the task force on programs and approval of its recommendations by Council has established guidelines for monthly lectures, including videotaping; affirmed continuation of non-lecture programs, such as theater attendance, outings to cultural attractions, and negotiation with the Philadelphia Orchestra to allow attendance at open rehearsals; and continuation of the sessions on retirement PASEF currently offers.  Recommendations of the communications task force have led to enhanced communication with the PASEF membership, substantial redesign of the PASEF website, and continuation of the writing of detailed minutes of Council meetings. The task force on membership affirmed continuation of cooperation between PASEF and ASEF–PSOM on several programs and events. It recommended that future lectures and retirement sessions, including those which will be in-person, be live-streamed. Further, a proposal from the task force to expand the PASEF membership to include Research Faculty, full-time Academic Clinicians, and full-time Practice Professors is currently under consideration.

Archives Project

Lois Evans and Sarah Barr have worked to collect PASEF archival materials, both in hard copy and electronic forms. They have met with Acting University Archivist Jim Duffin. Oral histories are being compiled from living former Presidents, and all collected materials will be transferred to the University Archives. Further, a policy and procedures document to guide future maintenance of the archives has been drafted.

Faculty Senate and University Council

PASEF sends non-voting representatives to the Senate Executive Committee, four Senate committees, and the University Council Committee on Personnel Benefits. The Senate committees are the Senate Committee on Faculty and the Administration, the Senate Committee on Faculty and the Academic Mission, the Senate Committee on Students and Educational Policy, and the Senate Committee on Faculty Development, Diversity, and Equity.

PASEF Annual Election

Janet Deatrick chaired this past year’s Nominating Committee, and the Committee’s proposed slate was approved by email voting. Janet Deatrick is the President-Elect, John Keene Secretary, and Martin Pring the SEC Representative. Newly-elected at-large Council members who will serve three-year terms are David Balamuth, Peter Conn, and Marilyn Stringer.  Ann Mayer will serve a two-year at-large term to fill a vacancy.

—Paul Shaman, President (2019–2020)

Appendix: PASEF Council Members, 2019–2020

• Roger M.A. Allen, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations (SAS), Representative to the Faculty Senate Committee on Faculty and the Academic Mission
• David Balamuth, Physics and Astronomy (SAS), Representative to the University Council Committee on Personnel Benefits
• Janet Deatrick, Family and Community Health (Nursing), at-large member of Council; chair, Nominating Committee; co-editor, Hitchhiker’s Guide to Faculty Retirement
• Marc A. Dichter, Neurology (PSOM), at-large member of Council
• Lois K. Evans, Family and Community Health (Nursing), Past President
• Howard I. Hurtig, Neurology (PSOM), at-large member of Council
• Barbara Kahn, Marketing (Wharton), at-large member of Council
• John C. Keene, City and Regional Planning (Design), at-large member of Council, Representative to the Faculty Senate Committee on Faculty Development, Diversity, and Equity
• Janice Madden, Sociology (SAS), President-Elect
• Carolyn Marvin, Annenberg, at-large member of Council
• Ann Mayer, Legal Studies and Business Ethics (Wharton), Secretary
• Marshall W. Meyer, Management (Wharton), Representative to the Faculty
• Senate Committee on Faculty and the Administration
• Martin Pring, Physiology (PSOM), Representative to the Faculty Senate Executive Committee; co-editor, Hitchhiker’s Guide to Faculty Retirement
• Howard M. Rosenberg, Dental Medicine, at-large member of Council
• Brian M. Salzberg, Neuroscience (PSOM), at-large member of Council; co-chair, Community Involvement Committee
• Jorge J. Santiago-Aviles, Electrical and Systems Engineering (SEAS), at-large member of Council; co-chair, Community Involvement Committee
• Paul Shaman, Statistics (Wharton), President
• Anita A. Summers, Business Economics and Public Policy (Wharton), chair, Membership Committee; Representative to Faculty Senate Committee on Students and Educational Policy
• Peter Wilding, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine (PSOM), ASEF–PSOM President

Former PASEF Presidents:

• Benjamin S. P. Shen
• Gerald J. Porter
• Neville E. Strumpf
• Vivian C. Seltzer
• Roger M. A. Allen
• Ross A. Webber
• Rob Roy MacGregor
• Jack H. Nagel
• Anita A. Summers
• Paul Shaman

The University of Pennsylvania Libraries’ Schoenberg Institute for Manuscript Studies (SIMS) recently announced receiving $100,000 planning grant from National Leadership Grants for Libraries, a program of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS).

The IMLS grant has been awarded to the Penn Libraries on behalf of Digital Scriptorium, a consortium of 34 institutional members representing American libraries and museums across the country. The grant will provide funding to plan the redevelopment of Digital Scriptorium’s online platform.

Since 1997, Digital Scriptorium has been committed to providing free online access to its members’ collections of pre-modern manuscripts. Digital Scriptorium’s ultimate objective is to create a novel platform—using linked data technologies—to integrate all of its member institutions’ collections into an inclusive, open access, online catalog of pre-modern manuscripts housed in U.S. institutions.

“Penn Libraries has been a proud member of Digital Scriptorium since the very beginning,” said Constantia Constantinou, H. Carton Rogers III Vice Provost and Director of the Penn Libraries. “We are thrilled to be collaborating with peer institutions on the creation of a state-of-the-art, open-access database for pre-modern materials.”

“This is an exciting opportunity,” agreed Lynn Ransom, curator of programs at SIMS and project director for the grant. “SIMS will play a significant role in a national manuscript studies project of unprecedented magnitude.”

At its inception, Digital Scriptorium premiered an online platform to address the immediate needs for access and discoverability of pre-modern manuscripts. Its online database has grown to serve an international community of scholars, librarians, teachers, and students. Online technologies have changed dramatically in the 23 years since Digital Scriptorium was launched, however, and the original platform requires renovation.

“Thoughtful and strategic steps taken over the past several years have prepared us for our next great challenge,” explained Debra Taylor Cashion, president and executive director of Digital Scriptorium since 2015.

In 2017, the Digital Scriptorium Board of Directors polled its database users about improvements that might be of benefit to their research. Digital Scriptorium 2.0 (DS 2.0) will incorporate this feedback in the next stage of development of a national catalog, which will moreover provide a center of authority control and standardization for manuscript cataloging practices.

In 2018, SIMS invited Digital Scriptorium to present on the future development of DS 2.0, which ultimately resulted in Penn Libraries’ becoming the administrative sponsor of the IMLS grant.

“With a firm base of support from Penn Libraries and the rest of our participating institutions, the Digital Scriptorium consortium is both confident and enthusiastic to begin the development of DS 2.0,” said Dr. Cashion.

The year-long IMLS grant will support the planning phase of redeveloping Digital Scriptorium’s existing digital platform. Planning will entail refining the purpose and scope of DS 2.0, developing the DS 2.0 data model, and creating a plan for both technological and financial sustainability.

Even in the planning phase, DS 2.0 will serve as a cross-disciplinary model for incorporating stakeholder and community input to rebuild a legacy digital project into a viable and sustainable online resource.

Amy Kaplan, the Edward W. Kane Professor of English at the University of Pennsylvania, died peacefully at home in Philadelphia on July 30 of glioblastoma. She was 66.

Dr. Kaplan was born in New York City and raised in New Rochelle, New York. She attended Brandeis as an undergraduate, graduating in 1975, and she earned an MA in 1978 and PhD in 1982 in English from Johns Hopkins University with a specialty in late 19th-century American literature. She spent her early career at Yale and then at Mount Holyoke College.

She joined the faculty at Penn in 2002 as a professor of English. She was named the Edmund J. and Louise W. Kahn Endowed Term Chair in the Humanities in 2004 (Almanac February 10, 2004). She became the Edward W. Kane Professor of English three years later (Almanac April 24, 2007). Dr. Kaplan also served as chair of the English department from 2013 to 2016 and was a member of the history graduate group.

“Dr. Kaplan was a scholar of American literary and cultural studies, an extraordinary thinker and writer whose work on the culture of US imperialism transformed the field and will resonate for generations of scholars to come,” noted her good friend Judith Frank, the Eliza J. Clark Folger Professor of English at Amherst College. Dr. Kaplan’s students and colleagues testify to her intellectual courage, her lack of sentimentality coupled with tremendous kindness, and the way her work inspired them and shaped their own scholarship.

Dr. Kaplan was the author of The Social Construction of American Realism and The Anarchy of Empire in the Making of U.S. Culture, and the co-editor, with Donald Pease, of the seminal Cultures of U.S. Imperialism, whose essays excavated the histories of expansion, conquest, and resistance that have shaped the cultures of both the United States and the countries it has dominated. She was president of the American Studies Association from 2003 to 2004, during the invasion of Iraq, and she used her platform to call upon scholars to continue to disrupt the narratives that the American empire tells about itself.

Her final book, completed right before her diagnosis, was Our American Israel: The Story of an Entangled Alliance, which is animated by the shadow history of her own life as a young Jewish intellectual in the 1960s. The book is a wide-ranging examination of the contested historical and cultural terrain that made many “come to feel that the bond between the United States and Israel was historically inevitable, morally right, and a matter of common sense.”

Among her honors and awards, she received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship and the Norman Foerster Prize for the best essay in American Literature in 1998 for “Manifest Domesticity.” She was a member of the School of Social Science at the Institute for Advanced Study.

Dr. Kaplan is survived by her partner, Paul Statt; her daughter, Rose Weiss; her mother, Eunice Kaplan; her sister, Lisa Kaplan (Leon Katz); her brother, Jonathan Kaplan (Alyssa); her stepdaughter, Molly Statt; her nieces and nephews, Toby Vandersall (Matt), Abby Katz, David Katz (Susean), Jeff Kaplan, and Traci Kaplan; and two great-nephews, James Solomon Vandersall and Solomon Ellis Katz. Charitable donations in her name may be made to the National Brain Tumor Society’s Race for Hope Philadelphia and to the Middle East Children’s Alliance.

Jerry Sun, a class of 2023 Wharton undergraduate student and TA for Wharton summer programs, was killed in a car accident west of Cañon City, Colorado, on July 25 while he was on a hiking trip. The crash is under investigation, and alcohol and speed are not factors in the accident. He was 19.

At the time of the accident he was living in College Point, New York; at Penn, he lived in Speakman, Ware College House. Mr. Sun was a member of Cohort Rand. He was active in the Wharton Management Club, Wharton Private Equity and Venture Capital Club, Wharton Real Estate Club, and Wharton Giving Society. For the last two months, he worked as a TA with high school students in Wharton summer programs.

“Jerry brought happiness and laughter with him wherever he went,” his family said in a statement. “His curiosity was insatiable and his spirit was unbreakable. He was selfless in his desire to help others and a source of comfort in times of distress. He was incredibly gifted but humble, a quick learner but perpetually diligent. He was an aspiring entrepreneur, loyal friend, and beloved son.”

“Jerry took to teaching immediately, and his students took to him just as quickly,” noted Eli Lesser, executive director of the Wharton Global Youth Program. “We are heartbroken to think of Jerry not being part of our program and our community.”

Mr. Sun is survived by his parents and his sister.

Andrea Leah Wiest-Weidman, a graduate student at Penn Nursing, died unexpectedly on July 30. She was 38.

Ms. Wiest-Weidman graduated from Penn State University with a BS in marketing and management in 2006 and a BS in nursing in 2012. She worked as a breast care nurse coordinator, a transplant nurse coordinator, and a financial analyst. She also served in the Air Force for six years.

Ms. Wiest-Weidman enrolled in Penn Nursing in 2018 to pursue her MSN degree in the adult gerontology primary care nurse practitioner program with an adult oncology minor. She was to be awarded her Penn Nursing MSN degree this month.

“She always had a smile on her face and made everyone feel welcome in her presence,” said Susan Renz, director of the Primary Care Program. “She was an excellent student who excelled both in the classroom and in clinical, providing evidence-based, compassionate care to her patients. The art of nursing is the art of healing bodies, minds, and lives, and extending grace, hope, and an engaging smile on the journey. In that, Andrea was nurse artist extraordinaire.”

At the time of her death, she lived in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. She is survived by her husband, Tim; her parents, Richard and Karen Wiest; her siblings, Kelley Hadlow (Charles), Danielle Artus (Jason), and Derrick Wiest; and seven nieces and nephews.

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To Report A Death

Almanac appreciates being informed of the deaths of current and former faculty and staff members, students and other members of the Penn community. Email almanac@upenn.edu

In a recently published study analyzing the characteristics of the 100 most cited articles in prosthodontic journals between 1951 and 2019, one by Penn Dental Medicine’s Markus Blatz, professor and chair of the department of preventive and restorative sciences, was among the top 10. The study appeared in the May issue of The Journal of Prosthetic Dentistry with Dr. Blatz’s “Resin-Ceramic Bonding: A Review of the Literature” ranking sixth for the most citations. At the time of the study, Dr. Blatz’s article, which appeared in The Journal of Prosthetic Dentistry in 2003, had been cited 1,052 times.

Articles that are widely cited are considered important in the field of prosthodontics as they can provide information on advances, the areas of most extensive research, and the future direction within the field.

GSE Associate Professor Manuel S. González Canché, GSE Professor of Practice Joni Finney, Vice Provost for Faculty and GSE Centennial Presidential Professor of Education Laura W. Perna, and colleagues from Research for Action, the Tennessee Higher Education Commission, and the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association were awarded a $35,000 grant from the American Educational Research Association (AERA). The grant will fund the first national research conference on performance- and outcomes-based funding in higher education, called “Performance Funding in Higher Education: Connecting Forty Years of Policy, Research, and Practice,” along with the first edited book on the topic.

The overall intent is to host a diverse array of scholars and policymakers to present and discuss research/policy issues and move forward with an edited volume from AERA. Although the conference has been postponed due to COVID-19, the team is working with AERA to extend the funding period. More information is available on the Penn AHEAD website at https://www.ahead-penn.org/content/performance-funding-conference

U.S. News & World Report recently released its honor roll of best hospitals for adults. HUP-Penn Presbyterian ranked #15 overall on the national list.

The U.S. News Best Hospitals analysis reviews hospitals’ performance in adult and pediatric clinical specialties, procedures and conditions. Scores are based on several factors, including medical outcomes such as survival; patient experience, nurse staffing and more. Hospitals are ranked nationally in specialties from cancer to urology and rated in common procedures and conditions. Hospitals are also ranked regionally within states and major metro areas. The Best Hospitals Honor Roll recognizes 20 hospitals with outstanding performance across multiple areas of care.

Penn Presbyterian ranked #21 in cancer; #19 in cardiology and heart surgery, #11 in diabetes and endocrinology, #9 in ear, nose, and throat; #16 in gastroenterology and GI surgery; #20 in gynecology; #15 in nephrology; #18 in neurology and neurosurgery; #41 in orthopedics; #13 in pulmonary and lung surgery; #27 in urology. It ranked #1 regionally in Pennsylvania and Philadelphia. 

In addition, Pennsylvania Hospital was ranked #40 nationally in gynecology and #4 overall in Philadelphia.

Charles Kane, Christopher H. Browne Distinguished Professor of Physics in the department of physics and astronomy, is among the six recently announced honorary degree recipients for next year’s convocation ceremony at the University of Chicago.

Dr. Kane received a bachelor’s degree in physics from the University of Chicago in 1985, where he worked in the laboratory of former University of Chicago provost Thomas Rosenbaum, who introduced him to condensed matter physics—the field of study that later became his career.

Dr. Kane’s work on topological insulators has been recognized by several awards, including the Oliver Buckley Prize, the Dirac Medal, the Benjamin Franklin Medal, the Breakthrough Prize (Almanac October 23, 2018), and the BBVA Frontiers of Knowledge Award (Almanac March 26, 2019).

Penn Medicine’s new office tower located on Civic Center Boulevard has been awarded a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Silver Certification. The 300,000 square-foot, 10-story building, which opened in 2018, provides a state-of-the art collaborative workplace for crucial health system support functions including Information Technology and Human Resources.

A LEED certification is a globally recognized symbol that promotes achievement in sustainable design  and construction. In order to become LEED certified, a building must accrue a certain number of credits based on specific environmental criteria both in design and construction ranging from the use of energy efficient systems and healthy materials to the recycling of construction waste.

The Sachs Program for Arts Innovation recently announced grants awarded from its recent call for proposals for projects led by or primarily serving Black artists and practitioners within the Penn community. The eight selected projects represent a diverse collection of practices—including publications, art installations, community workshops, and performance—and are led by a range of community members, including Penn staff, alumni, students, fellows, and artists.

Similar funding opportunities will be available this fall, as part of Sachs’ grant cycle for 2020-2021. Sachs is committed to the long-term work needed to promote diversity, equity, inclusion, and anti-racism in its work, and to support BIPOC artists and amplify their voices.

• The Afterverse: Alex Smith, Staff Member
• The Gathering Workshop Series: Black Cultural Studies Collective, Graduate Student Group
• Witness: Farrah Rahaman, PhD Student, and Tshay Williams, Alum
• Transmission as Resistance: Redox Drip: Fields Harrington, Alum
• Recipes for the Revolution: Meals Our Ancestors Made Possible: Gillian Maris Jones, PhD Student
• Sickle: Maya Arthur, Post-Bac Fellow, Alum
• The Sis Uprising: Ricardo A. Bracho, Artist in Residence
• All at Once: Rosa Leff, Alum

See the previously announced 2020 grantees in the May 12, 2020 issue of Almanac.

Karen I. Winey, TowerBrook Foundation Faculty Fellow, professor and chair of the department of materials science and engineering and professor in the School of Engineering’s department of chemical and biomolecular engineering, has been awarded the 2020 Herman F. Mark Senior Scholar Award from the American Chemical Society (ACS) and the 2020 Braskem Award for Excellence in Materials Engineering & Science from The American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE).

Dr. Winey was among the first to fabricate polymer nanocomposites with carbon nanotubes and devised processing methods to manipulate their hierarchical structures to improve their electrical and thermal properties. Dr. Winey has also dramatically expanded the range of nanoscale, self-assembled structures found in single-ion conductors with the intent of designing plastics with exceptional transport properties for batteries and separations.

The Mark Scholar Awards, given by the ACS Division of Polymer Chemistry, were established in 2006 to “recognize excellence in basic or applied research and leadership in polymer science by scientists of all ages.”

The Braskem Awards, given by AIChE’s Materials Engineering and Sciences Division, date back to 1970. Dr. Winey’s award is in recognition of her “outstanding contributions to the understanding of and advancement of polymer nanocomposites and ion-containing polymers.”

Whether you’re looking for materials to support your classwork, further your career, or if you just want to enjoy a good book or movie, the Penn Libraries can help.

Borrowing is Back!

Book lovers have something to celebrate: earlier this summer, the Penn Libraries mobilized to re-connect faculty, students, and staff with physical collections.

Through Pickup@Penn, you can now request books and pick them up at Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center using your PennCard.

Books by Mail is available to current Penn students, staff, and faculty. After completing online registration, you can request that circulating materials listed as “available” in the Libraries’ Franklin catalog be shipped to your home address.

FacultyEXPRESS provides mailed delivery of books and documents for all standing tenured and tenure-track Penn faculty, with a cap of five articles per day.

Find the latest service updates at https://www.library.upenn.edu/blogs/libraries-news/covid-19-faq

Read, Search, and Stream

The Penn Libraries gives you immediate access to ebooks, streaming videos, and more, whether you’re on campus or working remotely.

The Franklin Catalog is a good place to start your search for online books, journals, and databases.

Use subscription streaming services, including Alexander Street Press and Kanopy, to access concerts, operas, movies, documentaries, and educational videos.

Download the Lean Library browser extension for off-campus access to Penn Libraries’ licensed content, like scholarly articles and newspaper websites, from any laptop or desktop computer. 

Use PressReader to view digital copies of newspapers and magazines and read them online from cover to cover, just the way they were printed.

Get virtual support, find expanded digital offerings due to COVID closures, and get in touch with a librarian at https://www.library.upenn.edu/about/covid-19

More to Explore

There’s plenty to pique your interest in the Penn Libraries’ network of 14 distinct libraries, recognized for their literary and artistic artifacts, and the network’s digital library covers a wealth of social and historical periods.

The Libraries and its collaborators have curated dozens of online exhibits you can access from the comfort of your couch. Discover 1960s protest drawings from Ashley Bryan, a World War II veteran, author, and artist; explore the archive of Philadelphia’s own Marian Anderson, a world-renowned singer; and reflect on Jewish domestic culture in a global context.

The world’s oldest dental book, published in 1530, is undergoing a thorough examination by the Levy Dental Medicine Library. You can join the crowdsourced effort to translate the toothy tome, Die Arzney Buchlein wider allerlei kranckeyten und gebrechen der tzeen (“booklet of remedies against all sorts of diseases and infirmities of the teeth”) into English.

Mintel’s Global New Products Database, available through the Lippincott Library of the Wharton School, lets you track trends in consumer products across the globe. Find out the most and least common flavors of spoonable yogurt (strawberry and orange, respectively) and track down information about antibacterial claims on cleaning products.

Find more information about each library and its collections and services at https://www.library.upenn.edu/penn-libraries

Children’s Activities

Penn Museum

Info and free registration: www.penn.museum

8/14    Summer Exploration Kit: Heroes, Giants and Monsters.

8/18    Global Voyagers: Explore the World!; 11 a.m.

Fitness and Learning

8/12     Pediatric Primary Care, Pediatric Acute Care NP, and Prenatal Care NP Webinar; join admissions staff for info about several programs; virtual event; 12:30 p.m.; register: https://tinyurl.com/nursing-webinar-8-12 (Nursing).

            Pediatric Primary Care NP, Family NP, and Adult Gerontology Primary Care NP Webinar; 2:30 p.m.; register: https://tinyurl.com/nursing-admissions-webinar (Nursing). 

            Webinar: Reimagining Legal Technology–Reimagining the Future of the Profession; virtual event; 3 p.m.; register: https://tinyurl.com/penn-law-technology (Penn Law).

8/18     Bachelor of Applied Arts and Sciences Virtual Information Session; noon; register: https://lpsonline.sas.upenn.edu/events (LPS). 

8/19     Workday@Penn Q&A Live; have questions about Workday answered; virtual; noon; register: https://tinyurl.com/WorkdayQA (Workday@Penn).

Talks

8/12     Mind the Gap: Conversations About Life and Landscape Architecture; Lisa Switkin, James Corner Field Operations; Zoom meeting; 6 p.m.; register: https://tinyurl.com/mind-the-gap (Landscape Architecture). 

8/13     Site-Specific Approaches for Treating Ginvigal Recession Part 2: The Maxilla and Posterior Mandible; Vinay M. Bhide, periodontist; BlueJeans meeting; 5 p.m.; register: https://primetime.bluejeans.com/a2m/register/szjwgcjc (Penn Dental). 

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AT PENN Deadlines 

The Summer AT PENN calendar is online. The deadline to submit virtual events to be featured in an issue Update is the Monday of the prior week.

The performing arts have pivoted to respond to the challenges we have faced these past few months. Annenberg Center recently posted two virtual performances. 

The Koresh Dance Company’s “Hide Your Face/Unmask Your Heart” features three short films created and directed by Roni Koresh, founder and artistic director of the Philadelphia-based dance company. This “trilogy of yearning for normalcy, justice and peace of mind” is Koresh’s reimagining of dance expression during this time of trying circumstances, with one of the films including and revolving around seminal choreographers Rennie Harris and Rafael Xavier. This eye-opening project gives us the invigorating opportunity to reset our perspective. Visit https://tinyurl.com/annenbergshortfilms

New Victory Theater’s Arts Breaks provide a weeklong focus on an aspect of culture and the performing arts, with a different activity for each of five days. New Victory has done research on the outcomes of children’s early engagement with the performing arts and crafted thoughtful and fun activities based on this learning. Visit https://tinyurl.com/annenbergvictoryart

Penn Libraries will be hosting a virtual screening and panel discussion on Wednesday, August 12 at 7 p.m. The 20-minute documentary 9066 to 9/11 will serve as an educational tool and a primer on the Japanese American camp experience and its relevance today. The documentary focuses on the parallels between the post–September 11 treatment of Arab Americans and Muslims in this country with treatment of Japanese Americans after the start of World War II. Revealing striking similarities, the video addresses the mistreatment of immigrants in the United States, as well as the lack of historical memory by lawmakers and the public about America’s concentration camps during World War II.

The screening will be followed by a talkback featuring scholars from Penn and curators from the Japanese American National Museum.

This is event is co-sponsored by the University Task Force on Support to Asian and Asian-American Students and Scholars at Penn, Pan-Asian American Community House (PAACH) at Penn, Penn Libraries, and the Penn Program on Asian American Studies in Partnership with the Japanese-American National Museum.

The second annual Philadelphia Solar Week is August 17 – 23! Join us in a series of virtual events about how to go solar. The full list of programs and events can be found on the Philadelphia Energy Authority's event calendar. One particular event that may be of interest to Penn staff and faculty is Monday, August 17 (10-11:30am): Solar 101: Everything you need to know to go solar during COVID-19.

Learn more on the Philadelphia Energy Authority website, and register for a webinar (or multiple) here!

University of Pennsylvania Police Department Crime Report

Below are the Crimes Against Persons, Crimes Against Society and Crimes Against Property from the campus report for July 27-August 2, 2020. View prior weeks' reports. —Ed.

This summary is prepared by the Division of Public Safety and includes all criminal incidents reported and made known to the University Police Department for the dates of July 27-August 2, 2020. The University Police actively patrol from Market St to Baltimore and from the Schuylkill River to 43rd St in conjunction with the Philadelphia Police. In this effort to provide you with a thorough and accurate report on public safety concerns, we hope that your increased awareness will lessen the opportunity for crime. For any concerns or suggestions regarding this report, please call the Division of Public Safety at (215) 898-4482.

18th District

Below are the Crimes Against Persons from the 18th District: 8 incidents (3 assaults, 2 aggravated assaults, 2 domestic assaults, and 1 robbery) were reported for July 27-August 2, 2020 by the 18th District, covering the Schuylkill River to 49th Street & Market Street to Woodland Avenue.

With a pending election and the coronavirus, there’s no shortage of work for the team at Annenberg Public Policy Center’s FactCheck.org Here are some of its latest stories:

“Trump Ad Features Edited, Out-of-Context Biden Photos” (August 6, 2020) President Donald Trump’s reelection campaign has released an ad that features edited and out-of-context photos to illustrate Joe Biden “hiding” in his basement rather than taking questions from reporters on the campaign trail. https://tinyurl.com/factchecktrumpad

“Trump Misrepresents Obama-Era Fair Housing Rule” (August 5, 2020) President Donald Trump suggested that an Obama administration fair housing rule required the construction of low-income homes in suburban areas. It doesn’t. https://tinyurl.com/factcheckfairhousing

“False Ad About Biden’s VP Pick” (August 5, 2020) A Republican TV ad targeted at Latino voters in large cities falsely claimed that Joe Biden “promised his party an African American Vice President. Not a Latino.” https://tinyurl.com/factcheckfalsead

“Trump’s Misleading COVID-19 Comparisons to Other Countries” (August 4, 2020) In a flurry of tweets and remarks, President Donald Trump continued to distort the facts on the coronavirus pandemic. https://tinyurl.com/factcheckcovidcompare

“Trump’s Executive Orders on Prescription Drugs” (July 31, 2020) Trump recently signed executive orders that he says will reduce drug prices by 50% “and even greater in certain instances.” That could happen for some, but it remains to be seen how the orders will be implemented and whether they will result in such large reductions. https://tinyurl.com/factchecktrumpscrip

Penn Purchasing Services is pleased to announce the selection of a new set of licensed promotional products suppliers, including 14 Preferred Contract Suppliers that are now available to the University community for purchasing promotional products and branded apparel. 

These suppliers were chosen after a rigorous and inclusive Request for Proposal process led by Purchasing Services that included:

• engaging key stakeholders from across the University to ascertain the criteria they seek when selecting and working with a promotional products company;
• analyzing supplier spend recorded by Penn departments;
• identifying and inviting qualified local and diverse suppliers to participate; and
• soliciting proposals from almost 50 companies and selecting the suppliers that most closely matched Penn’s requirements.

In earning Preferred Contract Supplier status, these best-in-class suppliers offered pricing, service, and support that will deliver excellent value to the Penn community. While in the past there were only three suppliers awarded this designation, the increase to 14 Preferred Contract Suppliers will offer the Penn Community a variety of options for: product selection, pricing, distribution, and negotiated pricing. Having more Preferred Contract providers was something Penn key stakeholders felt was highly desirable. These companies can develop customized, creative solutions using their respective product portfolios, which contain a wide range of unique items to tailor a proposal to meet the needs of their clients. Importantly, each of these companies adheres to recognized sustainable and socially responsible practices and many are diversity-owned and local businesses. 

Should these companies not meet a particular need, 17 additional licensed suppliers identified during the RFP process are available. Penn faculty and staff can find additional licensed and approved promotional items suppliers by visiting https://cms.business-services.upenn.edu/publications/02-promotional-items.html

Members of the Penn community are reminded of the importance of working with licensed promotional items suppliers. These companies have agreed to adhere to the University’s Code of Workplace Conduct for Penn Licensed Product Manufacturers (Almanac October 3, 2017), which outlines a set of production standards and labor practices.

Questions may be directed to sourcing@upenn.edu

This year, our region is experiencing a significant population increase of Spotted Lanternfly (SLF), an invasive insect. 

Spotted lanternflies generally do not kill healthy trees, though they can cause significant damage on certain plants, particularly if they are already weakened. Its favored host tree is the Tree of heaven (Ailanthus altissima). SLFs feeding on tree sap results in large amounts of honeydew (partially digested tree sap containing sugars), which allows sooty molds to grow under heavily infested trees, which can damage plants and result in cosmetic damage to infrastructure like cars, benches, etc. Furthermore, honeydew attracts stinging/biting insects, e.g., wasps and ants. 

If you want to take action, the egg cases can be carefully scraped off in the winter, and killing the instars or adults by hand is challenging, but can slightly reduce local populations. Visit the Penn State Extension website at https://extension.psu.edu/spotted-lanternfly for more general information on spotted lantern flies.

On the Penn campus, Facilities and Real Estate Services, with Morris Arboretum, has developed a strategy to address this nuisance pest that has the potential to negatively impact over 70 different plant species. FRES is working to remove and/or treat (when appropriate) any Tree of heaven on campus. Penn is following expert recommendations that suggest limiting the use of toxic chemicals that are ecologically damaging and would not greatly reduce SLF populations. 

If you are among those on campus, email FRES if you see honeydew and it is creating an issue with hardscape usability because of stickiness, or an overabundance of wasps/ants at FREStrees@upenn.edu Include the date and exact location of the problem. Your information will help FRES to craft a custom treatment program.

Almanac will publish again on Tuesday, August 18 and weekly throughout August. For the complete publication schedule and deadlines, visit https://almanac.upenn.edu/publication-schedule-deadlines

Like the last few months’ issues, this edition of Almanac is digital-only. Please distribute to your colleagues and encourage them to subscribe to receive the E-Almanac by visiting https://almanac.upenn.edu/express-almanac The email will include links to the newly posted material. 

No issues were printed to distribute across campus because of COVID-19. Almanac is distributed electronically each Tuesday.