Pity the poor grad student? Slaving 12 hours a day in a lab? Barricaded behind books in Van Pelt-Dietrich? Sweating about future job prospects?

Not entirely. Grad students do have a life outside the lab, library and classroom. In past years, though, Penn graduate students' social lives have been fairly confined to their individual schools. And most--coming from other undergraduate colleges and universities--find themselves without old friends on an unfamiliar campus in an unexplored city.

But this year, the Graduate and Professional Student Assembly (GAPSA) has pumped new energy into the social lives of grad students across the University. A nursing master's student ice-skates at midnight with a Wharton MBA candidate. A med student introduces herself to an engineering grad student while they wait on line to get into Circa, a Center City restaurant and night club. A law student buys a beer for a GSFA artist during a GAPSA happy hour.

Call it dual-degree dancing or multidisciplinary mixing, it's the social equivalent of curricular collaboration on the academic side.

This semester alone, GAPSA is sponsoring 11 social events that, so far, have been "huge successes," according to Victor Prince, GAPSA chair, Wharton student and self-described "overgrown undergrad."

"We've really tried to beef up" the sense of community among graduate and professional students across Penn, he explained.

The numbers back him up. Some of last year's GAPSA happy hours attracted an average of only 100 people. This year's happy hours--enhanced by live music and DJs--are packed with 500 or more. The Mardi Gras happy hour Feb. 16 drew 600 people to the Gold Standard. Eight hundred attended the Winter Holiday party.

When GAPSA planned its "Vogue Party" for Feb. 22 at Circa, its board expected, perhaps, 300 people to attend. Instead, 890 appeared, creating a queue that stretched from the club at 1518 Walnut St. down the block and around the corner to 16th and Locust Streets. Circa's manager couldn't believe the size of the turnout, Mr. Prince reported.

The Vogue Party was "an excuse to dress up," he added. "It was our largest event and we wanted it to be more upscale than usual."

Thursday evenings have proven to be popular nights for socializing as well. The first GAPSA ice-skating party, Jan. 25, drew an unexpectedly large crowd of 300 to the Class of 1923 Ice Rink between the unlikely hours of 11 p.m. and 2 a.m. The sequel on Feb. 29 was another hit. The beer and guacamole more than made up for any falls on the hard ice.

GAPSA also will host a "Back from Break Happy Hour" March 22 and a "Plain Old Happy Hour" April 5, both at the Gold Standard from 5 to 9 p.m. A gala "End of Year Party" will be held April 25 at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology from 5 to 9 p.m.

But partying isn't GAPSA's sole purpose. The assembly is the University-wide student government for Penn's 10,000 graduate and professional students. Social events "go hand in hand" with the group's representative function, in Mr. Prince's view, "and they are a way to communicate" among students across all 12 graduate and professional schools.

One of the sparks that has ignited the revival of grad-student life is electronic. Through e-mail and list servers, graduate students are staying in touch and promoting social events and committee meetings with greater ease.

GAPSA has also enhanced communications by creating a home page on the World Wide Web (http://dolphin.upenn.edu/~gapsa/what.html), and it has an e-mail address (gapsa@dolphin.upenn.edu).

In the past, it has sometimes been "hard to get grad students' attention and involvement," Mr. Prince said. "Some schools are tight-knit and have a lot of their own activities, while others don't seem to have as much of a need." Through more--and more-popular--social events, GAPSA is pulling growing numbers of graduate students into its other activities.

"Eleven of Penn's 12 grad schools regularly send representatives to GAPSA's monthly General Assembly meeting, a far higher percentage than in previous years," Mr. Prince noted.

As GAPSA representatives, grad students have a voice in University policy and operations by sitting on Trustee, University Council and Independent Council committees, as well as the Affirmative Action Council, Houston Hall Board, Dispute Resolution Board and 10 other committees. GAPSA has increased coordination with University Administrators this year and passed joint resolutions with the Undergraduate Assembly. GAPSA has also offered input for the President's Strategic Plan for the University and "improved channels of communication" with President Judith Rodin and Provost Stanley Chodorow, said Mr. Prince. "They are really listening to us."

A brighter social life and a more-influential role in the University community are just part of a larger achievement, some GAPSA leaders believe. "Penn's graduate-degree programs stand to benefit," said Surya Ghosh, first vice chair. "Penn will be able to attract the best graduate students in all of its schools because we will be the only one of its competing schools with an enjoyable graduate-student life.

"We will be the only university producing Ph.D.s where the student doesn't say that life sucks as a graduate student," he added. "That is certain to attract prospectives when they think of where they want to spend two to five years of their lives. And, as always, better graduate students will affect the entire University in better teaching and research."

Return to Compass Features for March 12/19, 1996