Martha A. Q. Curley has been appointed Ruth M. Colket Endowed Chair in Pediatric Nursing at CHOP. The goal of this appointment is to foster interdisciplinary and inter-institutional research in child health across Penn Nursing and Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP).

John L. Jackson, Jr. has been named dean of the Annenberg School for Communication at the University of Pennsylvania, effective January 1, 2019.

Ingrid Nembhard has been appointed as the inaugural Fishman Family President’s Distinguished Associate Professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, effective January 1, 2018.

Dagmawi Woubshet has joined Penn as the inaugural Ahuja Family Presidential Associate Professor of English.

Anne Norton, professor and department chair of political science, has been named the inaugural Stacey and Henry Jackson President’s Distinguished Professor of Political Science.

Daniel Q. Gillion, associate professor of political science, has been appointed Julie Beren Platt and Marc E. Platt Presidential Associate Professor of Political Science. Dr. Gillion studies racial and ethnic politics, political behavior, public policy and the American presidency.

Kasey Diserens, a Ph.D. student at the University of Pennsylvania, always wanted to find a way to link her interests in economic and social development with her passion for archaeology and ethics. Her work, studying and preserving the past, allows for a deeper understandings of how history can influence the present and how heritage preservation can become an impetus for real-time economic, social and political change.

On Tuesday, September 5, 2017, the Trump Administration announced that it will begin to phase out the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) status granted to an estimated 800,000 young people in the US, pending further action by Congress. The University has vigorously reaffirmed the commitments that first made in November 2016.

On Tuesday, September 5, 2017, the University’s Penn Futures Project (PFP) announced the names of the first Calvin Bland Faculty Fellows.  Supported by a $2 million endowment from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Fellows will collaborate on research aimed at improving the lives of at-risk young men and boys of color and their families.  The Fellows were selected from the faculty at the Schools of Nursing (Penn Nursing), Graduate School of Education (GSE) and Social Policy & Practice (SP2).

University Chaplain Charles Howard penned an op-ed in The Philadelphia Inquirer to mark the 54th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech. Howard pointed out how King brought about social change from the “prophetic middle,” which allowed him to push both sides and look toward a brighter future.