With links to countless remote and content-rich information sites, the Internet serves as an invaluable teaching and learning tool, and its value as a scholarly resource will only grow. Looking beyond Penn's physical campus, our Wharton School will be using distance learning technology to offer academic opportunities to those seeking continuing education in the field of business - at a variety of locations that are thousands of miles from Philadelphia. The program was a great success, and it promises to transform the way we prepare our incoming students for campus life. These are just a few examples of how we are rethinking what it means to teach and learn in the information age. I and my colleagues at Penn look forward to many future occasions when we may explore with you the issues of teaching and learning to our mutual benefit.
American universities play an essential role in the realm of basic research.
Indeed, basic research in the United States is vested primarily in institutions of higher education. I believe the truly great institutions of higher learning in the 21st century will be centers of transformative research, and that is why I take Penn's research mission so very seriously. On the undergraduate level, Penn's research agenda is closely tied to our teaching mission. One learns best by doing, and Penn undergraduate students benefit in innumerable ways from their access to world-class research. One of my highest priorities as president of Penn is preserving and enhancing that access.