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Byline: Alina Lebedeva Transitioning from high school to college can be very scary and confusing, let alone going through the same transition while moving to a new country. Here are [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva The 2022 Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts wrapped up on Sunday -- for the first time since 2019. Artists, volunteers, visitors and musicians attended the event [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva In the midst of Arts Fest week, a few State College locals took the time to organize a protest at the Allen Street Gates against the Supreme [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva State College's annual Juneteenth Festival, commemorating the legal end of slavery in the United States, took place at Dr. Martin Luther King Plaza on Saturday. The event [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva Stipends for Penn State graduate assistants are increasing by 3% starting fall 2022, according to university president Neeli Bendapudi and executive vice president and provost Nick Jones' [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva State College's branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People partnered with Penn State's College of Arts and Architecture to host an art exhibition [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva As even more sunny days approach in June, students who have remained in State College for the summer are choosing different places where they can spend time [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva For the first time since 2019, Penn State hosted Special Olympics Pennsylvania's Summer Games from June 2-4. More than 2,000 athletes across the state arrived at Penn [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva OurBus, a busing company active in many eastern states, announced it would launch a new bus route on Monday. The route will connect State College and Atlantic [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva 'Bloodshed in Buffalo,' a social justice vigil organized to honor the lives of the ten Black victims who were killed in a recent mass shooting in Buffalo, [...]

Byline: Alina Lebedeva The Center for Sexual and Gender Diversity hosted Pride Takeover 2022 in the HUB-Robeson Center on Wednesday. The four-hour takeover consisted of live performances, interactive events and [...]

A Japanese district court has ruled against the Aum Shinrikio religious cult's Moscow branch and ordered the confiscation of its property. For seven months, the court has heard testimony that the cult is experimenting on people and their technique of reaching a spiritual high by depriving the brain of oxygen is causing brain damage. Other evidence claims miraculous healings. This civil case is unrelated to the government's case against the cult for poisoning the Tokyo subway.

The prospect of higher wages are encouraging foreigners to seek employment as construction workers in Moscow despite the less than ideal working conditions. Workers come from the Baltic states, Turkey and other distant regions. However, companies prefer to hire Muscovites due to the expenses associated with hiring foreign labor such as housing, registration and tickets to and from Moscow.

A Russian extremist group calling itself the Revolutionary Military Council (RVS) informed the media that it planted a bomb at the Peter the Great monument on Krymskaya Naberezhnaya. The militants are demanding that the Lenin museum, the symbol of Communism, be left alone. It is believed that RVS did not intend to actually blow up the monument, perceived as a symbol of Russia's new statehood, but only to emphasize their demand.

The Arkhangelskoye estate museum in Russia has been deteriorating because of lack of governmental support for its upkeep. Since its acquisition by the country's Defense Ministry, maintenance has been irregular and only undertaken when visiting officers arrived and their cultural needs had to be met. The military establishment preferred to invest their finances on a sanitarium.

Campaign against Tsereteli's Peter the Great monument is heading towards a referendum. Marat Gelman, a member of the referendum initiative group, has mobilized students to take up the campaign as students cannot be accused of any self-interest. Gelman has left out the artists to avoid accusations of professional jealousy. The referendum asks Muscovites about their opinion regarding the issue of dissembling Peter the Great and other works of similar type.

Automatic photo booths which offer photos of varying sizes in about a minute, are a welcome sight in Moscow. The color laser-prints are of high quality and incorporate the latest technology of digital images. The technology makes photography fast, convenient and cheap. The booths have attendants who advise customers on appropriate poses for photographs and help them choose the right snaps. Although the system is automatic, posting booth attendants is necessary due to the complex behavior of the Russian customers.

Zurab Konstantinovich Tsereteli's penchant for pleasing the powers that be by obeying their orders has led him to own several properties to promote his sculpting business. Initially, his business was confined to his native Georgia, from where he expanded to Moscow. Tsereteli gave his daughter in marriage to the son of the chief architect of Moscow and became the official artist of the Moscow Olympics. During the Perestroika he added a foundry in Minsk, and later two properties at Sorge Street and Leninsky Prospekt and a store in Moscow Architectural Committee's building to his empire.

The sisters at the new orthodox nunnery of Makary-on-Pisma have varied backgrounds, with a wide range of experiences from their previous life and the life at the nunnery. Sister Maria came to the convent after she lost her daughter, and the church had offered her the strength to carry on with life. Valentina, who from her childhood suffered from illness joined the Church, where she washes and irons clothes. Yulia had led a wayward lifestyle before joining the convent, where she is the convent's travelling agent. Mother Superior Angelina came from a family of nuns and she looks after the sisters.

The Russian Federation has expanded its list of social criteria for determining a woman's right to undergo a late-term abortion. The new list has 13 criteria for discontinuing a pregnancy, compared to 7 in the 1987 Health Ministry instructions. A woman's financial condition, and the tragic realities of contemporary life, such as being a refugee or needing resettlement, are the new points in the expanded list. Also, the date of late-term abortion has been moved back from the 28th week to the 22nd week.

The construction site at Volkhonka Street around the Cathedral of Christ the Savior is the largest of its kind in the post-Soviet era. The rebuilding of Moscow's largest church has raised questions about the foundation and the mode of financing. A special research group has been formed to collect information on the original cathedral. While the decorative works, such as murals, icons, are being selected on the basis of competitions, facade reliefs are the products of the effort of many sculptors. Fragments of the cathedral's main iconostasis has been found at the Mineralogy Museum.

Russian Minister of Science and Technological Policy Boris Saltykov feels additional agreements are needed to deal with Eastern states regarding intellectual property problems. He discusses the problems of entering barter deals, citing the example of bartering of Russian know-how for Chinese sheepskin coats. He discusses about the pirating methods adopted by the Eastern firms and focuses on the unsuitable working conditions and less salary in East Asia. However, he opines that Russian institutes ultimately benefit as finances obtained are used for developing future know-how.

The initiative of Russian Culture Minister Yevgeny Sidorov to solve the legal dispute between the Ostankino Museum Estate and the Optina Pustyn monastery over the allotment of land goes against the Presidential directive. The Minister proposes to give part of the land to the monastery though the President has included the museum in the list of valuable monuments. The legal battle has continued since 1992. The monastery demands 1.5 hectares of museum land for their use as homestead.

The Tretyakov Gallery is mounting an exhibit of 300 icon-paintings, secular paintings and album and easel graphics from Moscow, St. Petersburg and provincial museums. Entitled 'Primitivism in Russia, 18th-19th Centuries,' the exhibit showcases for the first time many works belonging to the so-called primitivist artists such as Bolotov and Stakhovsky, who had no formal training but were somehow familiar with painting techniques.

Edward Studennikov, a Russian landscape-painter, reveals that he has been involved with painting for the past thirty years, but it is only in the last six-seven years that he started painting seriously. It is ironic that his works are more famous in France, Belgium and Switzerland than in Russia. He is holding his first solo-exhibition in Russia. He feels that Russia should follow the path of spirituality, reflecting his belief in Christianity.

Sergei Yenikopolov, an expert on the psychology of terror, provides insights on the phenomenon of terrorism. He says terrorists resort to violence as an act of desperation. Yenikopolov explains that when it becomes evident that things can no longer be changed, some people engage in terrorist acts. He adds that in a totalitarian state, terrorism is bound to emerge. He also warns of possible terrorist acts in the country in the wake of Russia's invasion of Chechnya.

Russia's Islamic Cultural Center's proposed construction of an elaborate complex to the south-west of Moscow, covering 6.5 hectares, drew widespread protests from local residents since the project was begun without government approval. Citizens were unhappy with the size and location of the complex, which will extend into a park where a spring sacred to Christians is situated. Some prominent Muslims of Moscow disapproved of the activities of the Islamic Cultural Center and its leaders.

A former worker at the Tretyakov Art Gallery in Moscow, Russia, describes the renovated gallery scheduled to be reopened to visitors in Nov or Dec 1994, after a nine-year closure. The building only partly retains its old image, the museum being more European than before and the gallery area having been increased from 5,000 to 7,000 square meters. The Russian Ministry of Culture, the Moscow government and foreign organizations supported the nine-year extensive renovation of the building.

Authorities are trying to control the cholera epidemic in Daghestan, Russia, which is spreading due to poor sanitary conditions. Municipal services are ineffective and dead animals are often found in the October Revolution Canal, from where water is supplied to Daghestan. Several measures such as the ban on the sale of home-made brews and examining residents before allowing them to travel are being taken to stop the spread of cholera. The grant allotted by the Russian government to treat people suffering from the disease is not sufficient.

Russians are against the construction of a Moslem Cultural Center in Moscow as they believe that the center will lead to the deterioration of Orthodox culture and encourage mafia activities by Moslems. The center includes a mosque, a sports-health complex, a hotel, an exhibition hall, a library, residential buildings, stores, offices, a craft's workshop and an Eastern medical center. The plan of the project designed by Elvira Yunuskhadzhayeva covers 6.5 hectares of land as opposed to the two hectares authorized by the Moscow's governmental decree of 1992.

The Russian Orthodox Church's demand for attaining icons from museums angered the intelligentsia, which views them as cultural relics and historical monuments. As a result, the intelligentsia is turning away from the Orthodox Church. Russian government will decide if the property should be divided between the cultural institutions and the church.

The Kratovo dacha community, covering an area of 74 hectares near Moscow, Russia, was turned into a rehabilitation center for handicapped children in 1992-93 by the federal government. Disabled children such as those with cerebral palsy, epilepsy or paralysis are treated here and their families get subsidized accommodation. In 1994, Russian President Yeltsin decided to make the Business Management Department responsible for maintaining the center.

An agreement signed between Yevgeny Sidorov, Russia's Minister of Culture, and Patriarch Aleksy II of Moscow and All Russia, aims at greater cooperation between the Church and cultural institutions such as museums. Some of the religious buildings will be transferred to the Church so that the Church can function side by side with the museum. However, some clergy are unhappy as the museum's activities may disturb religious services.

Disputes over ownership of art objects and cultural legacies of the former USSR are increasing while museums continue to lose their possessions through claims from other over objects held by them. Art objects collected from different regions in the USSR and acquired from family heirlooms and legacies are being claimed by their natural inheritors from different CIS republics. Russia has not built an adequate legal system to solve such disputes, which often involve moral and ethical aspects of handling art works.

Pres Boris Yeltsin has decided to remove the two icons, Trinity and the Virgin of Vladimir, from the State Tretyakov gallery and hand it over to the Russian Orthodox Church. A controversy has erupted due to this and museum authorities and the Church are in conflict over this. According to the President, national wealth should not be separated from national cultural values.

According to the authors' abstract of an article published in Journal of Biotechnology, "Three new approaches to design effective immunogens are considered. At first, we derived an expression vector from [...]