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(11/22/00 10:00am)
Police officials from Penn and Temple University revealed at a press conference Monday the new half-million-dollar Computer Aided Dispatch system that will link the two forces to the Philadelphia Police via a high speed Internet connection.
The CAD system will allow dispatchers to determine which of the forces is closest to the crime scene and can best respond. It turns the emergency centers of the three departments into one streamlined dispatch center capable of handling a larger volume of calls much more efficiently.
The system links the three police departments by a T1 line, and allows the 911 dispatchers to coordinate calls among the three departments.
Prior to the installation of the new system, calls in the vicinities of both Penn and Temple would often get responses from multiple units after emergency calls, unnecessarily draining police resources.
"We never knew what the city's police department was doing or vice-versa," said Carl Bittenbender, the managing director for Temple's Campus Safety Services. "The only way we knew that the city's police department was responding to a call was if we had a police scanner on, or saw a Philadelphia Police car on campus."
The CAD system was activated on June 22, and little or no communication existed among the different police departments before that. Penn had a police scanner sitting in its dispatch room, while Temple had no communication with the Philadelphia Police at all.
With the CAD system, during a robbery the 911 call would be phoned into the Philadelphia Police dispatch center. There, on one of a bank of computer monitors, an operator would enter the call as a robbery, the location of the incident and any other information relevant to the officers on duty. The information would then be sent over the CAD network to the dispatch centers of the three departments, where dispatchers would locate units from each department and send the nearest one to deal with the problem. Often, one department has units closer than the other, and the dispatcher can direct the closest one to the location of the crime.
"What you have is an improved response time," Bittenbender said. "It also allows us to use our resources more efficiently."
The new system fixes the response time for police units anywhere between 30 seconds and three minutes.
Recently, when a large fire broke out near Penn's campus, police dispatchers were able to coordinate Penn and Philadelphia units to the scene using the CAD system.
University Police Chief Maureen Rush said that often the Penn Police officers are less busy than the Philadelphia officers, and that they can respond to calls near campus without draining the Philadelphia Police's resources.
Philadelphia, Penn and Temple are setting an example for other universities in large cities. "The model in place here is unique," said Skip Funk of Litten/PRC, Inc., the vendor that built and operates the CAD system. "We hope to see it become a standard for police departments across the country."
Funk added that Boston is also considering implementing a CAD system because of the large number of colleges within the city.
(11/14/00 10:00am)
Turn up John Stephens' microphone -- he wants to be heard.
And if Saturday's Foundation-sponsored "Soulcoming" concert was any indication, he will be.
Penn alumni John Stephens and Rob Murat, who both graduated last year, performed their mix of R&B; and soul to a crowd of more than 100 students and Philadelphia residents packed into the Rotunda.
The two singers each performed 1 1/2 hour sets of their own material to an energetic crowd.
Both Stephens and Murat currently work in New York as consultants for major financial firms, but plan to become full-time performers.
While at Penn, Stephens was the musical director for the a cappella group Counterparts, while Murat was the musical director for The Inspiration a cappella group.
"[Music] will be my full, 100 percent life," Murat said. "This is my passion, this is my destiny. I'm living a double life -- if I'm not at work, I'm working on my music."
Stephens said he feels the same way.
"I want to get a record deal. I want to get out there and be heard by as many people as I can," he said.
Stephens recently did lead and backup vocals with Pras -- formerly of the Fugees -- for the rapper's upcoming album, and worked with Lauryn Hill on The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill as a pianist.
Success won't come easily, though -- and they both know it. Indeed, the two men acknowledge the great deal of persistence needed to survive as an unsigned artist.
"There's no formula to it, you can't just decide, 'I can make a hit,'" Stephens said. "You never know what anybody else wants, but you just gotta keep making art that you think is true and authentic. I think that's the biggest challenge."
Stephens counts Lauryn Hill as one of his major influences, from a philosophical and artistic standpoint.
"Lauryn made this artistic album that people emotionally connected with, and it was able to be a pop success," he said. "That's what I want to do. I want people to respect the work I do and also listen to it. I think soul music needs some more real artists. Hopefully I can help fill that void."
Until Stephens makes it big, he's playing clubs in Philadelphia and New York several times a month and working to get his demo heard. "I'm not that big yet," Stephens said, "but it's exciting. I love it."
The Foundation is a student-run group that brings local and regional artists to Penn for concerts every weekend, for a total of 50 or 60 concerts a year.
Andrew Zitcer, staff advisor to the Foundation, said the program aims to promote interaction and understanding between West Philadelphia residents and Penn students.
"We're a community student collaborative group that focuses on the principle that art is a medium for social change," Zitcer said. "It's about bringing the local community together, using the arts to build bridges."
The program is working. The large audience was a 50-50 split of Penn students and Philadelphia residents.
"We saw John Stephens at the TLA about two months ago, and we came to see him tonight," Philadelphia resident Kerry Wilson said.
(11/06/00 10:00am)
The Steinhardt Jewish Heritage Program wants to remind students of their Jewish heritage and tradition, but it wants to feed them as well.
At 56 locations across campus Friday night -- college houses, Greek houses, off-campus locations and the Quadrangle's McClelland Hall -- an estimated 1,300 people gathered to enjoy a Jewish Shabbat dinner. Kugel, chicken, challah bread and wine were all on the menu for the once-a-semester dinner, which was funded by the JHP.
Rachel Baum, campus liaison for the JHP to Penn, organizes the dinners and helps recruit students as campus interns. "What I see out of these dinners is spreading the word about the Jewish Shabbat experience to people who haven't done it, and spreading the word about what the Jewish Heritage Program is," Baum said.
"Having the program is going to make the community stronger by having these dinners and make the community more excited about doing something Jewish," she added.
While the program works with Hillel House, the JHP is not affiliated with the University. The program at Penn is run by over 70 student interns, who helped coordinate and run the dinners at all the locations across campus. The interns are responsible for bringing people to the dinners and setting the program for the dinner.
The program is "peer-to-peer based," Baum said. "It's not me teaching them, it's them getting out to their friends. Everything comes from the students."
The student interns are responsible for putting together the social functions -- Shabbat dinners, wine and cheese nights and downtown parties -- to help build a greater sense of the already strong Jewish community at Penn.
College junior and Tau Epsilon Phi President Dave Lazar is one such student intern. His house hosted one of the dinners, attended by nearly 30 people, mostly TEP brothers.
"I think it's great. I think that any social organization that can bring together its members and have a social function like this -- I think it's powerful," Lazar said.
The participants at the dinner -- talking, laughing and eating -- seemed to have a good time. But one of the stipulations of the JHP is that all events must have a religious and educational component.
After blessings were made over the bread and wine, Baum and other interns passed around a booklet they had put together with various questions about faith and the Jewish experience before beginning the kosher meal. While trying to build community, JHP also tries to remind everyone what that community means and the basis behind it.
The JHP program was organized at Penn in 1993 and now covers 12 campuses up and down the East coast. In total, organizing and carrying out the campus Shabbat dinner costs around $3,500, which is donated by various philanthropists.
