As I was walking down Spruce Street near 34th, I noticed this new monstrous electronic sign in front of Irvine Auditorium.

Upon investigating where this sign came from, I realized that my own observation skills weren’t up to snuff. The sign has been in place since 2000, when Perelman Quad was redesigned.

However, the software for the electronic lettering was never able to function–until this summer when Facilities administrator Tom Hauber brought in a team to fix the half-decade long software glitch.

What irks me is that the sign faces onto Spruce Street, between 34th and 35th streets. So, unless you’re a doctor in the midst of surgery on the second floor of the hospital or a passer-by stuck at the red light at 34th Street while driving eastbound- there’s no chance you’d be able to read the sign. You’d have to fully turn your head 45 degrees to be able to read the sign at all.

The idea of an informational electronic sign is great–but the logic behind the placement of this behemoth is certainly flawed. I’d rather President Gutmann hire a town crier to deliver me news, because I’m certainly not going to risk neck problems for the rest of my life while trying to look at the information on this sign !

While this and the other information on the sign (like where to park) may be helpful to some, Penn needs to unearth this monster and make it so it is more useful than helping a few distraught visitors stuck in traffic on Spruce.

there’s finally some good news coming from the Social Planning & Events Committee: Hallelujah–Rufus Wainwright is the first.

Since I saw the horrendous film Clerks 2 last month, I was wondering why SPEC frequently brings such awful personalities to Penn. Actor/writer/director Kevin Smith, who was SPEC Connaissance’s keynote speaker last spring, was one of those awful choices.

Took your money last spring. Used it to create green background smoke. (moviehole.net)

How much money does it cost to bring a guy who made such a terrible film to Penn? Why couldn’t we bring someone with more interesting and thought-provoking words to share?

After all, the word “connaissance” means knowledge in French. What knowledge did anyone gain from Smith’s on-stage raucous on that cloudy night last April?

At a school where the Undergraduate Assembly allocates $676,000 (for the 2006-07 academic year budget) for SPEC events, is Kevin Smith really the best speaker that we can bring to campus?

I called Lee Kramer, the SPEC faculty advisor, to find out just how much money Smith charged as a speaking fee. Kramer wrote to me via e-mail that “Contractually, we are unable to publicize/announce speaker and concert fees as all bids and contracts are confidential.” This lack of open information is completely unacceptable. Such figures should be made public.

A major problem in the organizational structure of SPEC is its lack of transparency. Although it is public information that last year’s budget was $648,000, students are not privy to information about how much money is allocated to each of the nine SPEC committees or how much it costs to bring each performer to Penn.

Of the $2,766 General Fee that each student pays to the University as part of our tuition, roughly 5 percent of that money, or $1.4 million goes toward the “Student Activities Fee.” These funds go directly into the UA’s coffer.

Since practically half of this $1.4 million is allocated to SPEC each year, the student body deserves to know where this money is going. We also deserve more input when determining where it will go.

One major problem is that too few people are involved with the SPEC decision-making process. Sitting in on a few SPEC Connaissance meetings last year, I observed that there were less than ten voting members present at each meeting. These members were presided over by three directors. A committee should consist of more than a few cliques of friends, since it is making decisions for the entire student body.

A second problem is that committee members don’t popularly elect SPEC directors. Rather, the directors from the previous year select them. This undemocratic behavior creates a culture of favoritism.

It would make more sense to have SPEC directors appointed by the UA. The UA controls the budget for SPEC, so it would be logical for this popularly elected body to choose which individuals control the money allocated to SPEC.

Filling Irvine Auditorium’s 1,260 seats is really not a challenging feat. Just ask the folks from the Vagina Monologues, Penn Masala, or Off The Beat. Surely SPEC can bring someone like Kevin Smith to Penn and sell out Irvine, but it should not be billed as an educational event. Let it be a standup comedy show. We should bring speakers who teach us, rather than incite cheap chuckles when they use the word “cunt” in public.

It seems that there is some hope for the future. Incoming SPEC President Catey Mark has made positive changes to the SPEC infrastructure that can be improved upon in the coming year. “Last year, SPEC made it a priority to cater our programming to students’ interests,” Mark said. “We conducted a student survey and collected information on students’ general preferences.”

It’s amazing what happens when you listen to the voice of the people. Last spring’s OAR show was a significant improvement over the Sonic Youth Spring Fling Concert of 2005, if by no other measure than the ten-fold increase in the number of tickets sold.

But the 530 students who spent time taking SPEC’s online survey last year had little impact on influencing who specifically came to Penn. This is because the questions were too broad. One question reads, “What sort of speaker would you most like to hear? Actor, Film Industry, Political, Human Rights, Music Industry, Sports Industry.”

It’s about time to return the power to the people. Why not simply allocate a few days for the entire student body to vote online for a slate of five speakers who the student body would like to see?

What could be more democratic than that?

We need to get down to the nitty-gritty and give SPEC a serious overhaul so previous debacles are not repeated. Direct student voting, UA input in selection of SPEC directors, and improved surveys are the keys to making positive changes.

As if John Mark Karr and Jon Benet conspiracy theories haven’t consumed enough of your day, a new creeper has emerged from the Deathstar also known as Huntsman Hall.

Several days ago, Scott Ward, an emeritus professor at Wharton, was arrested on child sex charges. Federal agents at Washington Dulles Airport became suspicious of the many trips that Ward had taken to Thailand. While Ward had been a visiting professor at a Thai university several years ago, they suspected that Ward was also engaging in sex tourism.

L. Scott Ward

As I read the coverage, memories of my Women’s Studies classes haunted me as I remembered learning that 4/5 of tourists to Thailand were men traveling alone. And let me tell you, they weren’t all solitaire players coming to town for tournaments. Thailand’s government turns a blind eye to the most lucrative sexonomy in the world.

But where did all of this come from? Was this the first infraction of this beloved marketing aficionado? Not at all.

This was Ward’s third arrest on similar sex charges in 11 years. In 1999, Ward entered an Alford plea, which means that he plead guilty while maintaining his innocence. He was fined $2,000 and put on probation for five years.

While Ward has been a successful professor here since 1980, his trials for sex crimes in 1995 and 1999 should have raised more than a few red flags. It doesn’t matter if we’re to have Adam Smith or John Maynard Keynes on our faculty–Ward has been a liability for the University for over a decade. This case demonstrates a clear series of failures at several levels. Most importantly: How did an Ivy League institution keep this man on its faculty? Are there any other creepers lurking in our halls?

It’s hard to tell, as “Penn conducts background checks for staff in certain divisions but does not conduct background checks on faculty,” according to an e-mail response by Lori Doyle, Penn’s VP of Communications. “This is the typical practice at most colleges and universities.”

This lack of background check for faculty members is ridiculous and will hurt the University again. Every person from the entry-level janitor to provost should be subject to a criminal background check by University of Pennsylvania Police Department and the results should be taken into account while hiring.

Just as Tracy McIntosh should not have been let off easy because he was a professor, there is nothing about holding a prestigious position that should exempt members of our faculty from a simple background check.

The Wharton Deathstar, Former Home of a Creeper (alumni.upenn.edu)

Ward’s repeated arrests while still employed by the University should motivate the President’s Office to consider investigating the histories of more faculty and staff members.

Furthermore, businesses operating on University-owned properties should be required to conduct criminal background checks on their employees. This may have prevented the theft of my friend’s wallets last summer, which I later found out was perpetrated by an employee of Strikes Bowling Alley. Penn is Strikes’ landlord–only a firm background check policy will prevent future incidents.

The Rodin administration and Wharton deans who let Ward stay after his arrests in the 1990s have escaped this ugly situation. But Penn Human Resources must make sure that no accused, convicted or Alforded felons are employed by the University.