{"id":418510,"date":"2025-12-02T02:31:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-02T02:31:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/418510\/"},"modified":"2025-12-02T02:31:14","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T02:31:14","slug":"charlotte-pulica-penns-pr-needs-to-be-hacked","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/418510\/","title":{"rendered":"Charlotte Pulica | Penn\u2019s PR needs to be hacked"},"content":{"rendered":"

Unless you\u2019ve been doing a full internet cleanse for the past few weeks, you\u2019ve probably read all about the Penn Graduate School of Education hacker<\/a> and received the multiple blunt emails impersonating Penn\u2019s administrative board. While Penn has always loved a scandal, reading \u201cWe hire and admit morons because we love legacies, donors, and unqualified affirmative action admits\u201d felt bolder than usual. It\u2019s no secret that people have strong opinions about Penn \u2014 we\u2019ve all seen the people handing out flyers \u2018exposing\u2019 our school\u2019s corrupt ways and the comments on every school Instagram post \u2014 but lately the resentment has amped up. It brought to light a sentiment that the administration can\u2019t ignore: Penn\u2019s PR needs to change direction.<\/p>\n

Penn was founded in 1740<\/a> and is the oldest university<\/a> in the United States. It rose to prestige in the late 20th century and is now ranked No. 7<\/a> in the nation. Not only that, but it\u2019s now No. 5<\/a> in terms of lowest acceptance rates, and its admission process is only getting more selective. Penn\u2019s history is broad and full of notable successes, including the creation of the first medical and business schools<\/a> in the U.S., pioneering research in the medical and computational fields, and boasting a long list of successful, household-name alumni. It was long regarded as a respectable and accomplished institution.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But does that still ring true today?<\/p>\n

Recently, it seems the nation is facing a rising trend in anti-education<\/a> sentiments which not only stem from the governmental slashing<\/a> of funding, but also an idea, whether or not the job market reflects it, that a college education just isn\u2019t valuable anymore. This puts Ivy League schools in a difficult place. With Penn\u2019s reputation closely tied to the Wharton School, it\u2019s hard to put this idea of elite political and business wealth against the new values our generation holds. It\u2019s becoming increasingly apparent that Ivy League institutions are more about politics than education, and people are rarely happy with our political decisions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Whether it be Penn\u2019s decision to \u2018negotiate<\/a>\u2019 with Trump over the Compact (we all know they love constructive feedback), the decision to revoke Lia Thomas<\/a>‘ medals, or the questionable handling of anti-Semitism on campus from then-president Liz Magill<\/a>, the past few years, it seems, have been scandal after scandal for Penn. But it\u2019s not just political events, it\u2019s the value Penn has been pushing for over a hundred years: prestige.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not that people don\u2019t accept the idea of prestige; it\u2019s that Penn has created an image of elitism tied to politics that doesn\u2019t sit well with the rest of the country. It\u2019s a message that shouts to people teetering on anti-education: Colleges are political, not educational. There\u2019s a difference between innate and performative elitism. Penn used to be an institution that spoke for itself; its name alone carried the title of respect and priority. But now, with the lack of enthusiasm for high-level education, we seem to be manufacturing a picture of elitism through political decisions and glossy pamphlets. Unfortunately, it\u2019s no longer appealing to the public. There\u2019s no need for a Top 10 school to promote wealth through political deals or put on a performative front telling the country about how amazing we are; we should be showing them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Penn\u2019s PR needs to shift away from trying to project elitism onto the nation and move towards letting our actions speak for themselves \u2014 in a good way, for once. Instead of telling communities how much further above them Penn is, we should be working with them to make education more accessible. Instead of presenting a facade of perfection, we should promote transparency and accountability within education. And instead of tailoring every decision to politics, we should be focused on who Penn is actually made up of: people from every corner of the world.\u00a0<\/p>\n

GSE being hacked was, at first, a humorous email that took over Sidechat for a day, but it turned into a call for Penn\u2019s administrative board. Prestige doesn\u2019t come from money or political alliances; it comes from making a genuine impact on the community. So, what do we really want to be known for, elitism or prestige? After 285 years, it\u2019s time for Penn to decide.<\/p>\n

CHARLOTTE PULICA<\/strong> is a first year student studying Criminology and Economics from Enoch, Utah. Her email is cpulica1@sas.upenn.edu<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Unless you\u2019ve been doing a full internet cleanse for the past few weeks, you\u2019ve probably read all about…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":418511,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5132],"tags":[5229,1448,2830,1311,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-418510","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-philadelphia","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-pa","10":"tag-pennsylvania","11":"tag-philadelphia","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-united-states-of-america","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","16":"tag-us","17":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115647629414186992","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=418510"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418510\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/418511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=418510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=418510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=418510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}