Undergraduate Students

LOOKING FOR EXCELANO: Majoring in English and Africana studies, Kassidi Jones is a senior from Hartford, Conn. Since the second semester of her freshman year, she has been a member of the Excelano Project, Penn’s premier spoken word poetry group.

One year ago, three Penn seniors wrote a 1,000-word description of their plan to create an after-school program for Latino teenagers in South Philadelphia, the centerpiece of their application for the President’s Engagement Prize.

Rachel Prokupek was rolling out pastry two years ago, pursuing a culinary degree at Le Cordon Bleu in Paris. Now the University of Pennsylvania sophomore is rolling out the first cookbook, Whisk, for food magazine Penn Appétit.

Homeless people are uniquely vulnerable, at risk of a variety of health problems, including chronic illness, hunger, pain, and infections. While resources exist to provide homeless populations with health insurance and care, those resources don’t always make their way to the people who need them.

In the streets of Senegal, thousands of young boys beg for food and money.

The eight Penn students chosen for the President’s Engagement and Innovation Prizes this year have demonstrated “immense grit, creativity, and leadership,” with projects to take on challenges that “couldn’t be more pressing,” said

A passion and commitment to improve the lives of those in the Latino immigrant community unites three University of Pennsylvania seniors who have different majors.

In the streets of Senegal, young boys beg for food and money, but two students from the University of Pennsylvania are working to address this issue through Project Y.V.E.T.A.,

A Google search back in 2013 started things off. Typing in “Philadelphia,” “homeless” and “church,” Ian McCurry, then a freshman in the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Nursing, found a way to reach out to a vulnerable community that he could assist and support using his growing knowledge of health care.

University of Pennsylvania President Amy Gutmann announced today the selection of eight undergraduates as recipients of the 2017 President’s Engagement and Innovation Prizes.  Awarded annually, the President’s Engagement and Innovation Prizes provide $100,000 in funding for Penn seniors