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May
31, 2001
CAMPUS BUZZ BY SANDY SMITH Laughter in the rain: Here’s proof that the rain failed to dampen the spirits of the assembled crowd at Penn’s 245th Commencement: The comments made during the conferring of degrees were among the wittiest in your Buzz correspondent’s recent memory. President Judith Rodin was in fine form May 21, starting with a little dig at the competition. After School of Arts and Sciences dean Samuel Preston introduced his school’s graduating students as “recipients of the finest liberal-arts education in the land,” Rodin responded with a reference to Princeton, where Preston got his Ph.D. “With all due respect to that up-and-coming school in New Jersey, you’re right,” she said. Later, after Interim Dean Neville Strumpf introduced the degree candidates from the School of Nursing, Rodin reminded the audience, “The nurses know who really controls health care.” Rodin also warned the Annenberg School graduates that Dean Kathleen Hall Jamieson would be watching their progress. “As Shakespeare said, it is far better to have a bad epitaph on your grave than an ill report from Kathleen Hall Jamieson while you live,” she said. And she did not forget the other main job of a university president. “Wharton graduates,” she said to Dean Patrick Harker’s flock, “when you make your fortune, please think of Penn and that building or faculty chair you will endow.” Our turn to party: Now that the students — well, most of them, anyway — have all decamped for the summer, it’s our turn to hang out on College Green. In fact, we’re invited to do so on Thursday, June 7, the date of the annual Faculty and Staff Appreciation Day picnic. From 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., Penn faculty and staff can enjoy box lunches from Bon Appétit, the cool sounds of City and Community Relations Director Glenn Bryan’s band Friends, and a chance to chat with friends and co-workers all over campus, including President Judith Rodin, Provost Robert Barchi and Executive Vice President John Fry. The event is free, but you must register in advance at www.hr.upenn.edu/quality/staffrecognition/spring.htm for your box lunch. Questions? Ask Orna Rosenthal in the Office of Human Resources (rosenthal@hr.upenn.edu; 215-898-5116). Some good advice: A recent RAND Corporation survey of medical Web sites found that most failed to deliver information needed to make informed medical decisions on major health problems. An exception to that rule was OncoLink, the on-line resource of the University of Pennsylvania Cancer Center. The site was one of only four of 25 surveyed that offered more than 80 percent of the minimum information needed. The researchers examined sites on obesity, depression, breast cancer (an OncoLink specialty) and childhood asthma.
What’s up over the summer? Watch this space on-line to find out. Check out www.upenn.edu/pennnews/current/2001/summer/buzz.html starting June 28. What's the buzz? Tell us what's happening! Call us at 215-898-1426, send e-mail to current@ pobox.upenn.edu or drop a line to the Current at 200 Sansom East/6106.
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