Diana Khoi Nguyen, associate professor and interim director of the Writing Program in Pitt’s Kenneth P. Dietrich School of Arts and Sciences, has launched 3 Sisters, a new online literary journal publishing poetry, fiction, nonfiction, essays, art and hybrid work.
Sam Podnar knows if she’s going to make her city a better place, she can’t shy away from difficult conversations.
The Pittsburgh native and graduating senior is deeply invested in advocating for the interests of her neighbors, at the polls and on the national stage. Sometimes the best way to get to know someone, Podnar said, is by first knocking on their front door. She’s led canvassing efforts and voter registration drives in support of multiple campaigns.
For Emma Levick, a dog made all the difference; in this case, a service dog named Zia.
In 2022, just a week before starting classes her first year at Pitt, Levick was paired with a golden retriever-Labrador mix from Canine Companions, a national nonprofit that trains and supplies service dogs at no cost to people with disabilities. Levick, who uses a wheelchair, described getting her first service dog as “life-changing” and the key to living independently from her family.
Growing up, Eli Hall’s family often visited the Allegheny Reservoir, a man-made lake that straddles the border between Pennsylvania and New York. Driving north along the shores, they’d see blue waters, boaters, swimmers, everything you’d expect from a summer lakeshore. But following that road into the Seneca Nation of Indians’ Allegheny Reservation, they’d see the reservoir change. Gone were the boaters and swimmers and gone were the blue waters. In their place was a mess of green algae. But why?
In collaboration with Carnegie Mellon University, Pitt has opened the Pittsburgh Federal Statistical Research Data Center (FSRDC), a flagship federal program overseen by the U.S. Census Bureau, in the Cathedral of Learning. The FSRDC program consists of 37 centers nationwide, which provide access to detailed federal data in a secure environment, enabling researchers to investigate questions that cannot be answered with publicly available datasets.
But the students have left a little reminder of their presence on the lab’s white boards: whimsical sketches of the semi-aquatic, croaking creatures they study. There are frogs eating ice cream. Frogs dressed as princesses. Frogs with pouting lips.
The Department of Geology and Environmental Science, in partnership with the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy, hosted an impactful volunteer day at the Frick Environmental Center in Frick Park. Participants worked alongside Parks Conservancy staff to manage invasive plants and maintain ecological restoration sites, which directly contribute to the care and stewardship of Pittsburgh’s treasured park system.
