This program provides a community in which students who speak or are learning Italian can come together to practice or maintain their language skills, as well as celebrate Italian culture. A variety of events each week, such as dinners, film-viewings (with discussion), and guest lectures, provides students with ample opportunity to immerse themselves in the language on a regular basis. The informal nature of the program, along with the regularity of events, gives residents just beginning to learn Italian a comfortable environment in which to take risks and make mistakes. At the same time, these novices are likely to acquire conversational skills more quickly because of the participation of more advanced students, as well as the Italian-speaking faculty and staff from both Harrison and the Italian department.

Goals: Casa Italiana’s primary goal is to provide students with opportunities to practice speaking Italian outside the classroom and to become more proficient, more quickly.

Expectations: Students attending floor events should be prepared to engage in an Italian-only language environment. Program residents are expected to help the GA to plan events and activities, on and off campus.

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This program acquaints first-year students at Penn with many of the resources and points of interest that the university and its surrounding community have to offer.

Goals: By bringing together freshmen with sophomores, juniors, and seniors with proven interests in mentoring, counseling, and developing the university community, this program will serve as an extended orientation program as students arrive, and will help those students develop into active citizens within their newly chosen, academic community.

Expectations: First-year residents are expected to attend the majority of events planned for the program. Upperclass Mentors for the program are responsible for helping with New Student Orientation, offering tutoring and study skills workshops, and working with three to five first-year members of the program throughout the academic year.

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This program invites students interested in the expression and study of the arts to join in learning community with others who share their interest. The program is open to members of Harrison’s Front Row Theater; to students majoring in Film Studies, Digital Media Design, History of Arts, or Fine Arts; as well as to film makers (especially participants in the College House Film Festival), members of the Penn Art Club, or Harrison’s Anime Club. Students who have taken any Cinema in Residence Courses may also apply.

Goals: Harrison and the Arts provides its residents with the opportunity to encounter and study a broad range of artistic media and expression; to learn from other program residents, who come from diverse academic and artistic backgrounds; and to take artistic risks within a supportive community.

Expectations:Members of the program will be expected either to participate in Harrison’s Front Row Theater; take, for credit, Harrison’s Cinema in Residence course; organize and participate in Harrison’s regular Art-In programs; or organize and attend Harrison’s Art Speakers Series.

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This program for upperclass students builds on the successes of the freshman Integrated Studies Program in Riepe College House. Interested applicants should be passionate about the liberal arts and eager to explore a broad range of intellectual ideas through an interdisciplinary lens. There will be a heavy emphasis on dialogue and teamwork among all of the participants in order to broaden students’ horizons through the sharing of knowledge and frequent interaction. Each month, a different aspect of the semester’s overarching themes will be explored. Each month will find a particular professor chosen to lead that entire month’s activities as well as the synthesis event at the end of the month.

The program participants will be expected to participate in a range of activities, from visits to the Philadelphia Philharmonic, Penn Museum, and Morris Arboretum, and lectures on neurobiology and on food — all to allow for multidisciplinary integration. ILP aims to build a true community among scholars from all backgrounds, not just the humanities — e.g.,Vagelos, Marketing, and Nursing, etc. — who together are exploring academia more deeply than they ever dreamed possible. The program hopes to spread this same spirit of inquiry and adventure beyond its floors to the House at large, and to encourage all House residents to participate in program events that are both educational and cooperative through group-building activities.

Goals: The goal of ILP is to encourage intellectual risk-taking within a supportive, multidisciplinary community setting. Students will learn to see their particular academic perspectives within a larger scholarly context and find, through dialogue with others in the program, connections among the different disciplines represented there.

Expectations: Residents are expected to participate in a representative variety of activities in order to foster multidisciplinary conversation and community integration.

To apply: Interested students must write an essay and describe in specific terms how they will be an asset to the ILP community and what they hope to gain from the experience.

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The Harrison Sophomore Experience Program will build on the programming from Harrison’s Freshman Experience Program and will help connect second-year students as they move beyond first-year orientation programs. Members will be primarily made up of second-year students committed to active thinking about their academic, professional, and personal goals and how the university can help them attain those goals. A small number of juniors and seniors may also be part of the program to serve as mentors.

Members of the program will be responsible for organizing and attending programs for both the Harrison Sophomore Experience program and the entire House, taking advantage of departments and resource centers such as:

• The Weingarten Learning Resources Center
• Career Services
• the Tutoring Center
• CAPS
• CURF
• Penn Alumni
• Alcohol and Other Drugs

Members will also engage actively with the Harrison Freshman Experience Program.

Goals: The program aims to assist second year students, no longer shepherded through freshmen year and not set in defined career paths or majors. Already possessing a good foundation of Penn and how it works, students in the Harrison Sophomore Experience Program will continue the exploration of academics, careers, and themselves, as the program will provide continued opportunities for academic success.

Expectations: Members of the program will meet bi-monthly and organize monthly programs of specific interest to sophomores. Members will be assigned to specific departments and resource centers to serve as liaisons to Harrison College House.

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