Penn Arts & Sciences
The University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences forms the foundation of the scholarly excellence that has established Penn as one of the world's leading research universities. We teach students across all 12 Penn schools, and our academic departments span the reach from anthropology and biology to sociology and South Asian studies.
Members of the Penn Arts & Sciences faculty are leaders in creating new knowledge in their disciplines and are engaged in nearly every area of interdisciplinary innovation. They are regularly recognized with academia's highest honors, including membership in prestigious societies like the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society, as well as significant prizes such as MacArthur and Guggenheim Fellowships.
The educational experience offered by Penn Arts & Sciences is likewise recognized for its excellence. The School's three educational divisions fulfill different missions, united by a broader commitment to providing our students with an unrivaled education in the liberal arts. The College of Arts and Sciences is the academic home of the majority of Penn undergraduates and provides 60 percent of the courses taken by students in Penn's undergraduate professional schools. The Graduate Division offers doctoral training to over 1,300 candidates in more than 30 graduate programs. And the College of Liberal and Professional Studies provides a range of educational opportunities for lifelong learners and working professionals.
- Behavioral and Decision Sciences Program
- Biological Basis of Behavior Program
- Center for Italian Studies
- Cinema and Media Studies Program
- Classical Studies at Penn
- College of Arts and Sciences
- Department of Anthropology
- Department of Biology
- Department of Chemistry
- Department of Criminology
- Department of Earth and Environmental Science
- Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations
Search results
Publication The Connection Cookbook: 3 Positive Application Recipes for Volunteers at Face to Face(2025-05-07) Mary Anderson, Landree Salazar, Taylor Siegal, Don ThiryThe Connection Cookbook is a curated set of interventions designed to generate momentum in volunteer engagement at Face to Face, a nonprofit organization serving the unhoused population in Germantown, Philadelphia. The initiative emphasizes strengthening connections through enhanced communication, interaction, structure, and recognition. From a menu of evidence-informed options, Face to Face selected three core strategies to implement: a quarterly email newsletter, structured rituals to open and close volunteer shifts, and a volunteer appreciation event. The accompanying "Cookbook" includes sample newsletter content, templates for rituals, an event agenda, evaluation guidance, and additional unselected intervention options for future consideration. These strategies are low-cost, relatively simple to execute, and can be delegated mainly to members of Face to Face's robust yet underutilized volunteer base—thereby minimizing the additional burden on the already overstretched Volunteer Manager at Face to Face.Publication Midland Area Coalition Wellbeing Leadership Training Intervention(2025-05-07) Vivien Tai, Sean Brennan, Derrek Cooper, Cameron MadillThe Midland Area Wellbeing Coalition aims to foster individual, workplace, and community wellbeing. To support this mission, we designed the Leader Wellbeing Training (LWT), a research-based intervention equipping leaders to embed wellbeing practices within their organizations. Grounded in positive psychology, the LWT integrates the PEMRAH framework, the U.S. Surgeon General’s Framework for Workplace Mental Health & Well-being, and the APA’s Psychologically Healthy Workplace model. Through a three-part workshop series, leaders engage in experiential learning, strengths-based reflection, and systems-informed approaches to drive sustainable culture change. The program emphasizes psychological safety, modeling vulnerability, and practical application, empowering leaders to cultivate environments where employees can thrive. This paper describes the Coalition’s context, relevant literature, and the intervention’s design, while addressing limitations such as time constraints, cultural resistance, and sustainability challenges. We propose the next steps for piloting and scaling the program, with a focus on continuous improvement and measurable outcomes. By educating and empowering leaders, this initiative advances the Coalition’s vision of creating a thriving, inclusive community where everyone feels good, struggles well, and functions effectively.Publication From Simulation to Savings: A Smart Grid Approach to Residential Load Management in Philadelphia(2025-05-19) Mikel Jorge Saralegui BedoyaPhiladelphia regularly experiences the urban heat island effect, heightening the impact of heat waves that are becoming increasingly common. As a result, the electric grid is increasingly inundated with peak energy demand during the summer months, which requires more power plants on standby to compensate. To track residential energy usage, an electric load modeling software named EDGIE (Emulating the Distribution Grid Impacts of Electrification) was used to monitor general and A/C energy usage of a Philadelphia row house. These A/Cs were then subjected to pre-cool one hour before daily peak heat events in the month of July, creating an opportunity for a virtual power plant (VPP) that could bundle the saved electricity of homes together for utilities to buy. Given the growing energy demands of programs like the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) Cooling Program, it is important to explore how load management technologies can address the rising energy usage associated with these efforts. Therefore, this study asks: How can the simulation of load managing devices impact rising energy usage from LIHEAP’s Cooling Program? EDGIE simulations show a roughly four percent decrease in power consumption, energy prices, and carbon emissions during peak periods, improving grid stability and reducing local stress. Results demonstrate that effective demand management not only yields significant savings in infrastructure and emissions costs for energy providers, but also underscores the need for further research into the origins and funding mechanisms of government cooling programs. While still in its infancy, load management shows promise for increasing efficiency in densely populated cities experiencing rising electrification trends, provided that load reduction strategies tailored to citizens and subsidized implementation of air conditioners can address challenges in grid stability.Publication Computational Analysis: How ExxonMobil Frames Climate Change's Market Risks(2025-05-19) Patterson, BronwynFor fossil fuel companies like ExxonMobil, public discourse is critically important, as appealing to the public- and investors- provides the capital that facilitates their growth and survival in the market. Despite the environmental and financial risks of climate change, there remains an acute disconnect between the outward facing statements of fossil fuel companies and their actual actions. My research partners the programming language R and Chat GPT4o-Mini with climate communication expertise to answer the question: how has ExxonMobil’s discussion of climate change within the “market levers” frame changed over time? In the past decade, ExxonMobil employed the “market levers” frame the most in June of 2019, March of 2021, and March of 2024, consistent with a general upward trend in frequency of the linguistic frame. 2015 reported the least number of press releases that included the frame, while 2019 included the greatest frequency. I conclude that ExxonMobil’s press releases discuss climate change via the “market levers” frame on a cyclical basis when calculated across a rolling 12-month average. This data provides a baseline for future climate communications research, beyond the scope of historical exploration. By employing R and ChatGPT, my work was able to examine a large corpus of climate change-related passages from Exxon’s press releases and identify patterns in the text that previous literature has been unable to manually identify. This primary data can be used to establish connections between different regulatory frameworks, financial risk, and climate-related communication in the energy industry at large.Publication Evaluating a Refrigerator Replacement Program For Low-Income Customers as a Cost-Effective Climate Strategy(2025-05-19) Montañez, BiancaThe energy transition is driving the implementation of cleaner energy infrastructure and more efficient technology for millions of Americans. Two significant pieces of American legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) are driving the transition in the U.S., aiming to enhance energy efficiency across the country. However, low-income communities continue to face significant barriers to accessing rebates to replace energy-efficient appliances. This study employs a mixed-methods approach to examine whether a streamlined program to replace outdated, inefficient refrigerators in low-income households could serve as a cost-effective strategy to reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions, improve energy security for low-income customers, and address administrative barriers in accessing federal incentives. We first explore administrative challenges, including application complexities, technological barriers, and eligibility discrepancies that hinder low-income households from fully benefiting from energy efficiency incentives, to establish the problem present with rebate programs. We then utilize emissions calculations alongside grid decarbonization assumptions to conduct a cost-benefit analysis that evaluates the energy efficiency and environmental impact of replacing outdated refrigerators with modern ENERGY STAR-certified models. Our results demonstrate that replacing outdated refrigerators with energy-efficient models significantly reduces electricity consumption and carbon emissions. Given that the program costs for the three scenarios analyzed are less than the social cost of carbon (SC-CO₂) estimated at $194 per metric ton CO₂e, results suggest that a refrigerator replacement program should be considered a cost-effective, accessible climate strategy that provides energy security benefits to low-income households. Ultimately, the outcomes of this research are crucial to better understanding practical adaptive solutions for a more economically viable and equitable energy transition.Publication Evaluating the efficacy of Tridacna derasa and Hippopus hippopus for measuring ENSO signatures in Palau(2025-05-18) Andrews, AliceTridacna shells are valuable archives in paleoclimate research due to their incremental growth bands, which record environmental conditions such as sea surface temperature (SST) and salinity through variations in oxygen isotopes (δ18O). Their potential for reconstructing past climate variability makes them a critical tool for understanding El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the primary source of interannual climate variability on Earth. In this study, we validate the use of two understudied species of Tridacna, Tridacna derasa and Hippopus hippopus, from Palau to identify ENSO signatures through oxygen isotopic analysis. Stable oxygen isotope ratios from three specimens were analyzed, and environmental signatures across species and locations (Malakal Harbor and West Passage) were compared. The Extended Reconstructed Sea Surface Temperature (ERSST) dataset from NOAA, the Multivariate ENSO Index extended version dataset (MEI.ext) from NOAA, and a Palauan coral δ18O record from Osborne et al. 2014 were used as baseline ENSO comparisons. The results indicate that both species of Tridacna record ENSO-related climate signals, with the younger H. hippopus from West Passage exhibiting the most pronounced δ18O fluctuations—particularly during La Niña events—suggesting a stronger response to precipitation-driven freshwater input. Conversely, the two shells from Malakal Harbor showed more muted isotopic variations but clearer ENSO signals, potentially reflecting site-specific variations due to differences in local hydrology and minimal exposure to freshwater runoff. These findings contribute to improving paleoclimate reconstructions using Tridacna shells by validating both species’ use for further ENSO research and highlighting the importance of site selection in isotopic studies. Future research is needed to investigate older Tridacna specimens to extend ENSO records further back in time and analyze additional environmental proxies, such as trace element ratios, to refine climate reconstructions.Publication Evaluating a Refrigerator Replacement Program For Low-Income Customers as a Cost-Effective Climate StrategyMontañez, BiancaThe energy transition is driving the implementation of cleaner energy infrastructure and more efficient technology for millions of Americans. Two significant pieces of American legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) are driving the transition in the U.S., aiming to enhance energy efficiency across the country. However, low-income communities continue to face significant barriers to accessing rebates to replace energy-efficient appliances. This study employs a mixed-methods approach to examine whether a streamlined program to replace outdated, inefficient refrigerators in low-income households could serve as a cost-effective strategy to reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions, improve energy security for low-income customers, and address administrative barriers in accessing federal incentives. We first explore administrative challenges, including application complexities, technological barriers, and eligibility discrepancies that hinder low-income households from fully benefiting from energy efficiency incentives, to establish the problem present with rebate programs. We then utilize emissions calculations alongside grid decarbonization assumptions to conduct a cost-benefit analysis that evaluates the energy efficiency and environmental impact of replacing outdated refrigerators with modern ENERGY STAR-certified models. Our results demonstrate that replacing outdated refrigerators with energy-efficient models significantly reduces electricity consumption and carbon emissions. Given that the program costs for the three scenarios analyzed are less than the social cost of carbon (SC-CO₂) estimated at $194 per metric ton CO₂e, results suggest that a refrigerator replacement program should be considered a cost-effective, accessible climate strategy that provides energy security benefits to low-income households. Ultimately, the outcomes of this research are crucial to better understanding practical adaptive solutions for a more economically viable and equitable energy transition.Publication Evaluating a Refrigerator Replacement Program For Low-Income Customers as a Cost-Effective Climate Strategy(2025-04-25) Montañez, BiancaThe energy transition is driving the implementation of cleaner energy infrastructure and more efficient technology for millions of Americans. Two significant pieces of American legislation, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL) are driving the transition in the U.S., aiming to enhance energy efficiency across the country. However, low-income communities continue to face significant barriers to accessing rebates to replace energy-efficient appliances. This study employs a mixed-methods approach to examine whether a streamlined program to replace outdated, inefficient refrigerators in low-income households could serve as a cost-effective strategy to reduce Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions, improve energy security for low-income customers, and address administrative barriers in accessing federal incentives. We first explore administrative challenges, including application complexities, technological barriers, and eligibility discrepancies that hinder low-income households from fully benefiting from energy efficiency incentives, to establish the problem present with rebate programs. We then utilize emissions calculations alongside grid decarbonization assumptions to conduct a cost-benefit analysis that evaluates the energy efficiency and environmental impact of replacing outdated refrigerators with modern ENERGY STAR-certified models. Our results demonstrate that replacing outdated refrigerators with energy-efficient models significantly reduces electricity consumption and carbon emissions. Given that the program costs for the three scenarios analyzed are less than the social cost of carbon (SC-CO₂) estimated at $194 per metric ton CO₂e, results suggest that a refrigerator replacement program should be considered a cost-effective, accessible climate strategy that provides energy security benefits to low-income households. Ultimately, the outcomes of this research are crucial to better understanding practical adaptive solutions for a more economically viable and equitable energy transition.Publication Evaluating the Impact of Reduced Compensation Structures on Residential Solar Net Metering(2025-05) Yena SuhThis research paper explores how policy design and government incentives regarding residential solar net metering programs have changed over time. Residential solar is important in transitioning individual homes towards renewable energy sources and net metering was a program intended to incentivize households that produced excess solar energy for the grid. Existing research analyzes how net metering policies have evolved over time to offer less net compensation to households by decreasing electricity pricing or adding extra charges for participating in the program. This study analyzes how such decrease in compensation affects the number of residential solar customers in net metering programs. The study employs a two-part methodology: 1) a descriptive analysis of policy revisions by state and 2) a time series analysis comparing policy changes by year and the percentage of state population enrolled in the residential solar net metering program. Data is gathered from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) Form EIA-861, covering the period from 2011 to 2024. The results are represented in line graphs and time series, which illustrate the continuous increasing trend in the number of customers despite lowered compensation. Customers are not sensitive to changing compensation rates and continue to opt into the net metering program. This trend is valuable in continuing to design policy that can best support the clean energy transition and understanding clean energy program features most important to customers.Publication Video For Senior Thesis - Rewilding Urban Spaces to Increase Pollinator Species Diversity: New Delhi(2025-05-18) Aman SharmaThis thesis assesses the impact of rewilding on pollinator species in urban spaces in New Delhi. Delhi has been facing a severe loss of biodiversity, and this research served as a pilot study to address this through micro-level urban rewilding projects. The test site was established as a 139 sq. m. private terrace garden in South Delhi. The project considered several aspects of rewilding such as increase in species sightings, native tree plantation and guiding principles for further research. Since several parts of Northern India share a similar landscape and species distribution, these findings are also relevant to other regions. The pilot study explored the potential increase in 2 types of pollinators – birds and butterflies. This is one of the first studies for the topographically unique region of Delhi, and with its focus on terrace gardens. It draws upon the findings of similar western research, and localizes their parameters to the specific context of Delhi. The study aims to showcase evidence of a positive correlation between species diversity and urban rewilding specific to Delhi, rather than prove a basis for causation. Its limitations are that the test sites were monitored by a single observer, leading to potential gaps in data. The thesis does provide recommendations for further research in the field, including 24 hour surveillance methods and the setting up of various test and control sites.