Penn Integrates Knowledge Professorships

"The time has come to lower the barriers that separate departments and schools. Discipline must reach across to discipline and build bridges of common understanding and shared purpose across all 12 of Penn’s schools and throughout the campus."

Former Penn President Amy Gutmann

Penn Integrates Knowledge University Professorships

As the challenges of our time grow more complex and consequential, Penn is poised like no other to innovate and lead. Through the recruitment of faculty who cross disciplinary boundaries, Penn fosters innovation and expands the world’s knowledge in new and unanticipated ways. Penn Integrates Knowledge (PIK) Professors hold appointments in two or more schools at Penn, and draw on their breadth of knowledge to collaborate with colleagues on boundary-breaking research.

With 12 schools on one contiguous campus, our world-class faculty – especially PIK Professors – are masterful collaborators. As they pursue their path-breaking work, they bring knowledge together across disciplines and use that knowledge to illuminate some of the most fundamental issues of our time.

On Campus and in the World

Archaeological site filled with stacked, dusty, aged bricks and surrounded by rocks..

Reconsidering world heritage for the modern era

Through recent research, archaeologist and Penn Integrates Knowledge Professor Lynn Meskell has continued to highlight how World Heritage Sites have become flashpoints for conflict and out of touch with local communities. 

Headshots of David Brainard, Duncan Watts, Susan R. Weiss, and Kenneth S. Zaret

Four from Penn elected to the National Academy of Sciences

The newly elected members, distinguished scholars recognized for their innovative contributions to original research, include faculty from the School of Arts & Sciences, School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Perelman School of Medicine, Annenberg School for Communication, and Wharton School.