Good morning, State College.

Today, sociologist Nancy Foner kicks off Hispanic Heritage Month at Penn State with a talk on immigration in the Liberal Arts Building, and a community ofrenda will be held tomorrow at the Paul Robeson Cultural Center; a Cultural Night with free food and live dance is set for Oct.-9.

The Stuckeman School announced Megan Young as its inaugural Immersive Environments Lab Fellow, awarding her up to $20,000 to develop her project Line Notes (which uses digital art to connect personal memories to everyday objects).

Students will join workshops and exhibitions to build a shared digital archive.

Clive Randall, a Penn State professor, received the inaugural Inamori-KYOCERA Award at an international ceramics conference in Sapporo (Sept.

6-10), honoring his advances in ceramic technologies.

Penn State Sustainability will host its 'Using AI in Sustainability Careers' webinar on Wednesday, Sept.

23 from 12:15 to 1:15 p.m. in HUB 131 (with a pizza watch party) and over Zoom; experts will explain how AI tools can boost sustainability work and guide career paths.

Joe Louis will become head of Penn State’s Department of Plant Science in the College of Agricultural Sciences on Oct.

7 after serving at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. He brings expertise in plant stress biology and insect interactions + extensive experience mentoring students to bolster research and teaching.

Penn State doctoral student Melissa Gonte was awarded a Copper Club scholarship for her leadership and sustainable copper extraction research and will use the funds to purchase a high-performance computer for her modeling + her success highlights our local ties to global industry trends.

During the 2023 and 2024 crop-growing seasons, researchers at Penn State collected water samples from multiple sites in Halfmoon Creek, finding that grab samples (active sampling) captured short-term spikes while passive samplers showed average exposure levels that help improve future tracking of water contamination.

Penn State researchers have improved a community health prediction model by adding cell phone visitation data, increasing its accuracy by 7.5% for depression and binge drinking measures across rural and urban areas (data collected in 2019).

The study may help local health planners and was published in Computational Urban Science.

The No. 12 Penn State women’s volleyball team will host Villanova at Rec Hall on Tuesday, Sept.

22 after a 3-0 win over Ohio on Saturday (keep it in PA).

At Beaver Stadium today, Penn State coach Matt Campbell provided injury updates ahead of Saturday’s game against Buffalo — noting Armstrong Nnodim and Alijah Carnell are nearly 100% while Cam Smith remains a question mark — and confirmed defensive end Max Granville suffered a season-ending injury in practice.

Penn State's offensive coordinator Taylor Mouser acknowledged the team's running game struggles following a 72-9 win, noting that all four running backs will see more play, including Quinton Martin Jr., who did not feature Saturday.

Coach Matt Campbell said that practice performance will help shape snap distribution in upcoming games.

Tuesday evening, No. 9 Penn State women's volleyball defeated Villanova 3-1 in the Keep it in PA match at Rec Hall thanks to standout plays by Gabrielle Nichols and Kennedy Martin.

The Nittany Lions will face South Florida at 6:00 p.m. Friday in Rec Hall.

Haley Burgdorf earned Big Ten Freshman of the Week honors after helping Penn State sweep DePaul, Stanford and Ohio on Sept.

14 — posting strong numbers with 10 kills in one match and becoming the first freshman to win the honor since 2024.