Bill Schackner stories, Page 5

Like so many of her peers, Addy Hildebrand saw the most cherished parts of her senior year slip away when covid-19 shuttered her high school and others exactly four years ago. Hildebrand, 22, of Derry, now a Robert Morris University senior, made her very first trip to a prom store...

A UPMC decision to close its Montefiore dental center has state Rep. Dan Frankel, D-Squirrel Hill, worried about how many patients will be displaced and the potential impact on their care. Frankel sought an explanation for the closure in a letter sent Friday to UPMC, a copy of which was...

Donor names end up on all sorts of college and university real estate, from imposing classroom buildings, to lecture halls, to flower gardens and even benches. Indiana University of Pennsylvania has its share of those sorts of spots. It also has this: A hotel front desk simulation lab that —...

If there’s an SAT exam in your future or that of your child, don’t worry about scrounging up a perfectly sharpened No. 2 pencil. You have outlived the paper era of the college entrance exam. Starting Saturday, an almost-century-old rite of academic passage for high schoolers will have bowed to...

Former Vice President Mike Pence will travel to Grove City College next month to deliver the keynote address at The Institute for Faith & Freedom (IFF) 2024 Conference “Confronting Antisemitism,” campus officials announced Wednesday. He will speak at 11 a.m. Thursday, April 11 in Crawford Hall Auditorium. In announcing his...

A nationwide search by the University of Pittsburgh to find its next provost and chief academic officer ultimately led to the person already doing the job since last summer on a temporary basis. Pitt officials announced Wednesday that Joseph J. McCarthy, interim provost and William Kepler Whiteford Professor in the...

Seated at a table of nonscientists, Kaigham “Ken” Gabriel explained how an ordinary-looking construction site in Hazelwood just might propel Pittsburgh to the forefront of reducing medical costs through gene therapy manufacturing. To make his point, the newly hired CEO of the University of Pittsburgh’s BioForge initiative pulled from his...

Washington & Jefferson College has named as its 14th president Elizabeth MacLeod Walls, now serving as president of William Jewell College in Liberty, Missouri. She will succeed John Knapp, who earlier disclosed plans to retire on June 30, officials said Tuesday. MacLeod Walls has led William Jewell College since 2016....

A combined system of 15 community colleges and 10 state universities would treat both tiers as equals, and they would equitably split a 15% funding increase in his proposed state budget, Gov. Josh Shapiro said Tuesday. In an appearance at the Community College of Allegheny County in Pittsburgh, the governor...

Robert Morris University wants to build a $28 million arena on campus for its Division I men’s and women’s hockey programs and is seeking $10 million from the state for the project. If it comes to fruition, the state-of- the-art venue would hold 2,500 people through general spectator seats “with...

West Virginia University police are investigating multiple burglaries and arsons reported this week inside the school’s Life Sciences Building, including one faculty office targeted twice in two days. The university issued an alert Friday following the incidents on its Downtown campus. In the first burglary, reported Wednesday morning, testing material...

The Biden administration this week canceled $1.2 billion in student debt nationwide. In Pennsylvania, that means 5,600 borrowers with a total of $45.1 million in debt have had their loans wiped clean, according to the U.S. Department of Education. The agency on Friday released a state-by-state breakdown of where the...

The University of Pittsburgh Friday became the latest institution to extend the deadline for first-year admitted students to decide whether to enroll. The May 1 deadline will be extended to May 15, officials said Friday. The move impacts thousands of applicants to Western Pennsylvania’s largest university and is the result...

La Roche University has named as its eighth president Christina Clark, former provost at Marywood University in Scranton, who has spent two decades as an academic at comprehensive Catholic universities. Officials announced the hiring Thursday. She takes office in July as the school’s second lay president in its 61-year history....

Were this any other year, the leader of Pennsylvania’s 10 state-owned universities simply might have needed to defend next year’s appropriation request and explain how it would enable a sixth consecutive tuition freeze. Instead, State System of Higher Education Chancellor Daniel Greenstein faced sharp questioning from state senators Wednesday about...

About 153,000 student borrowers nationwide learned by email this week that their college debt has been wiped clean by the federal government. The U.S. Department of Education says it has discharged or eliminated $1.2 billion in student loans under the Biden administration’s new income-driven student loan repayment plan called Saving...

Food safety inspectors from Allegheny County report finding violations in a campus eatery at Carnegie Mellon University after the school said numerous students reported symptoms consistent with a foodborne illness. The Allegheny County Health Department inspected Stack’d Underground in the basement of the Morewood Gardens residence hall on Thursday. Their...

Lower back pain is the leading cause of disability worldwide, and evidence indicates chiropractic care effectively treats pain with less reliance on opioids, some experts say. Those are among the reasons cited by the University of Pittsburgh for establishing a Doctor of Chiropractic (DC) program, the first at a research-intensive...

Pennsylvania’s 10 state-owned universities are extending the deadline for thousands of prospective new students to review financial aid offers and decide whether to enroll for fall. The move is intended to mitigate delays being experienced nationwide with the U.S. Department of Education’s revamped Free Application for Federal Student Aid, known...

The handwritten note found in a classroom on the Indiana University of Pennsylvania campus seemed harmless at first: “Hello student. Hope you have a good day!” But it ended cryptically with the initials “JK,” “lol” and an acronym for foul language. Then came something more ominous: A bullet was placed...

Their voices are likely shot, their ankles probably sore and they definitely could use some sleep. But the 700-plus dancers — and thousands more who participated in this year’s Penn State University IFC/Panhellenic Dance Marathon — know they made history, raising almost $17 million in the fight against childhood cancer,...

Mark Smail, a prominent Westmoreland County automotive sales executive whose family has been associated for half a century with selling cars, died Saturday after falling ill during a ride home from Seven Springs Mountain Resort. He was 62. Smail of Greensburg was a passenger in the car. He was transported...

“Aren’t you freezing?” The question was painfully obvious. But it was hard to avoid repeating it Saturday to runners young and old who huffed and puffed their way across the Roberto Clemente Bridge from Downtown Pittsburgh to the North Shore, wearing enthusiastic smiles, colorful skivvies and not much more in...

Penn State University trustees on Friday showed they want to retain President Neeli Bendapudi long term by approving incentives including a $1.5 million bonus if she stays in office through June 30, 2032. The vote to amend her compensation package came as the state’s flagship public university confronts what some...

College and university endowments in 2023 reversed a historically poor showing from the previous year by posting investment returns approaching 8% that favored institutions with less wealth over peers with billions of dollars in holdings. The findings are from a study of nearly 700 institutions nationally that was released Thursday...