Aaron Smith, an assistant professor at Temple University, who's known for rapping in class, celebrates his graduating seniors with a new song.

New Jersey cops attending the funeral of a murdered Delaware state trooper received an unusually heartfelt greeting when checking in to their hotel.

Delaware State Police Cpl. Stephen Ballard was gunned down in a convenience store parking lot April 26. His memorial service is Friday, and thousands of law enforcement from around the country descended on Delaware to pay respects.

That included a contingent from the New Jersey State Police, who received a special welcome from their Wilmington hotel.

"While we are very happy to have you stay with us, we do wish it was under better circumstances," the hotel's staff wrote in the letter.

"You protect and serve your communities every day and as such, it is our honor and privilege to serve you during this time."

The state police posted a copy of the letter on Twitter along with the hashtag #class.

After a tumultuous school year in which she lost a battle to play on the boys' basketball team, was expelled, then ultimately allowed back to school and to play with the boys, Sydney Phillips was honored for her fight alongside a woman who's had her own fair share of battles: Hillary Clinton.

Phillips was among eight honorees at the Ms. Foundation's Gloria Awards in downtown Manhattan Wednesday night. The annual Gloria Awards, named after Ms. Foundation co-founder Gloria Steinem, pays tribute to people who "ignite policy and culture change on behalf of women and their communities nationwide."

Phillips, who fought all year for the right to play on the boys' basketball team at St. Theresa's School in Kenilworth, was honored as "an emerging advocate for equality in education and sports." 

The seventh grader been told at the beginning of the school year that she could not play with the boys, even though the girls team had been dropped for the season. She sued her school and the Archdiocese of Newark, asking the court to intervene.

A judge initially ruled Phillips couldn't prove she had a legally established right to play with the boys basketball team, and then the school expelled Phillips and her sister for suing them.

"I just want to play basketball and now I'm being expelled, it makes no sense at all," she told News 4 at the time. "I don't want to go to any other school." 

Then in February, an appeals judge ruled that the girls should not be prevented from going to school -- and also that she should be allowed to play with the boys. In her first game with the boys, Phillips made two baskets against St. Genevieve. 

For a 14 year old, Phillips was joining a fairly select group: former Secretary of State and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was celebrated at the same event for her 40-plus years of public service and the way she has "inspired and ignited the power of women to join the political sphere."

Phillips even got to memorialize the moment fittingly for a teenage girl: a selfie with Clinton. 

At an immigrant detention center in Pennsylvania, handbooks issued to undocumented families come in English and Spanish. The information inside depends on the language in which it’s written, especially where sexual assault is concerned.

In the English manual, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement claims a “zero-tolerance” policy toward sexual abuse and sums up how to report crimes or suspicions in a single paragraph with bullet points. The Spanish version, meanwhile, fills four and a half pages and tells women not to drink or talk about sex so they won’t get assaulted during their time at the facility.

“You’re basically putting the blame on the residents,” said Reading-based attorney Jackie Kline, who represents detainees at the Berks County Residential Center.

The facility, which lies along the backroads of Leesport, houses asylum-seeking families from predominantly Central American countries. It is one of three ICE family detention centers; the other two are in Texas and tend to be used for short-term stays. Berks, on the other hand, has held women and children for up to 18 months.

As of early April, 51 immigrants were detained there, including 27 minors. Only a few adults at the facility are men. Most residents are mothers and their kids who have been assigned to expedited removal. Under President Donald Trump, expedited removal is expected to surge, affecting even more families who say they're running from danger abroad.

The information in the facility’s handbooks is ostensibly intended to protect female detainees from male aggressors, and it emphasizes the threat posed by other residents. But in reality, a vast majority of the men whom women encounter at Berks are staffers. A rape charge has never been brought against another detainee at the center, while a county employee has been convicted of sexual assault.

Counselor Daniel W. Sharkey served five months in Berks County Prison after he pleaded guilty to the institutional sexual assault of a 19-year-old woman who had already fled Honduras to escape sexual assault and domestic violence. A 7-year-old girl was the first to report the crime after she saw Sharkey and his victim having sexual relations in a bathroom.

Sharkey’s was the first case of its kind at any family immigration detention center. He was locked up for less time than the young woman whom he violated; she spent eight months at Berks.

The woman’s attorney, Matthew Archambeault, criticized the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services for not preventing the assaults.

“It’s their mission to protect these [kids], and they failed,” he said.

Sharkey’s lawyer, Allan L. Sodomsky, continues to claim that his client’s actions were consensual, though a June 2016 civil lawsuit the Honduran woman brought against Sharkey and Berks details several encounters when she says she was violated against her will.

Berks’ sex politics are especially relevant now as the state comes under pressure to close the facility, which is functioning under a license to house delinquents and dependents although all of its residents are accompanied by parents. After Pennsylvania's Department of Human Services announced that it would not renew the center’s license in February 2016, Berks claimed the decision was an unfair result of controversy surrounding the center — some of which concentrated on the Sharkey case — and pursued legal action. An administrative law judge ruled last month that the attempt to shutter the facility was unfounded, but the department still could appeal in the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania.

Because most of the mothers at Berks speak Spanish, they’re more likely to consult the Spanish-language handbook’s sexual assault section. The manual outlines procedures, like how to file a complaint, and includes definitions of relevant terms.

A subhead, “How to avoid sexual assault,” covers three-quarters of a page and makes recommendations absent in the English version of the handbook.

“Don’t consume drugs or alcohol; these substances can reduce your capacity to stay alert and make good decisions,” counsels the Spanish guide. “Don’t talk about sex. Other residents could think you’re interested in a sexual relationship.”

One piece of advice echoes a scenario from the 2014 incident, during which Sharkey gave his victim chocolate and presents for her son before demanding she have sex with him.

“Don’t accept gifts or favors from other people,” it reads. “Some people could try to force you to do something that you don’t want to do as payment for those gifts and favors.”

The handbook also suggests that women “walk in well-lit areas of the Center,” which is run by the county.

“First of all, they’re not allowed to have drugs or alcohol anyways, and the center should be providing well-lit areas,” Kline said.

Notably, Berks is not the only family detention center that advises women on how to avoid their own assaults. At Karnes County Residential Center in Texas, information on page 28 of a Spanish handbook published in June 2016 provides the same directions as in the Berks manual, with minor differences in word choice.  

Pressed repeatedly for comment about its handbooks and sexual assault policies, ICE did not respond. The agency did not explain why the content of both versions was so different or whether the manuals were written at the same time. The Berks Spanish guide is dated June 2016. The English version is undated but was used as evidence in a court case the same month.

In addition to its sexual assault guidelines, Berks has implemented other practices that some advocates say view women only as sexual objects. In November 2014, the center altered its dress code, which is reflected in both the English and Spanish handbooks. 

The dress code extends to all residents age 5 and older, and its rules are female-focused. Some of the restrictions include form-fitting or cleavage-exposing shirts; shorts higher than mid-thigh; and dresses and skirts, unless they are being used for religious purposes.

“This is what they told the moms," said Bridget Cambria, an attorney who defends Berks detainees. "‘Well you know, there are men who work here.’” 

One of the rules stipulates that “if an article of clothing is deemed inappropriate during the day it is still inappropriate for nighttime/sleeping hours.” On one occasion, this meant that because of concerns over propriety, a 9-year-old girl was admonished for wearing shorts to sleep when she kicked off her sheets in the night. Staff awakened her and forced her to either put on long pants or keep the covers on, according to attorneys.

After Archambeault’s client reported Sharkey, the center held a meeting with all of the women to enforce the new clothing policy, he said. He called the talk “your classic victim-blaming.” His client became unpopular among other residents, who accused her of spurring changes that adversely affected them and their daughters.

Staff members also targeted her, Archambeault said. When she came forward, an employee forced her to trade in a blouse after saying it was too revealing, and she became nervous about her outfit choices.

“She would come in and she’d say, ‘I don’t know if this is appropriate dress or not.’ And she’d be wearing tee-shirts and jeans,” he said.

ICE denies a connection between the Sharkey case and a dress code change. Three months after Sharkey was accused, though, women were forced to cover their bodies so they did not make others uncomfortable.

Archambeault submitted a request for any correspondence on the dress code reform, but it was denied. All he received was the November 2014 memo that announced an alteration in policy and explained when staffers should confiscate clothing. “If any item is questionable,” it cautioned, “have the residents try on the item and have a staff of the same gender view the resident.”

Archambeault decried the policy revisions, which he said assumed all men are predators. He added that implying a woman has invited sexual assault by the way she dresses or acts “is really chilling.”

“I hate all of that,” he said. “I hate all of it, because it’s so demeaning to women, it’s so demeaning to men.”

Berks, one of 211 ICE facilities, is not the only immigrant detention center that has faced criticism over its sex policies. According to Community Initiatives for Visiting Immigrants in Confinement (CIVIC), between May 2014 and May 2016, 1,016 sexual abuse or assault complaints landed on a desk at the Department of Homeland Security Office of the Inspector General. But accurate figures of abuse may be much higher, Christina Fialho, co-founder of CIVIC, told NBC San Diego. Between January 2010 and July 2016, the inspector general investigated only about one percent of over 33,000 complaints leveled against ICE and related to forms of sexual misconduct. 

Archambeault condemned the fact that no one at Berks expressed any remorse for what happened to his client.

“What was missing was a definitive statement saying that if this happens to you, you are a victim,” he said.

Pamela Osborne takes us live inside the Pennsylvania Convention Center, to give us a look at the Blue Cross Broad Street Run Health and Wellness Expo.

Philadelphia University will be renamed Thomas Jefferson University when the colleges complete a merger later this year, university officials announced Friday.

In an email to faculty and staff obtained by NBC10, Philadelphia University president Stephen Spinelli, Jr. said a research analysis showed Thomas Jefferson University has a “stronger brand and potential for building a stronger national and international reputation vs. a more regional reputation.” The research was conducted by branding firm FutureBrand.

University officials confirmed the change in a statement released Friday afternoon.

Spinelli said in the message that the university’s board of trustees came to the decision after conferring with students, faculty, staff and alumni. In an effort to retain the Philadelphia University name, the school plans to create two institutes — Philadelphia University Honors Institute and Philadelphia University Design Institute. The Kanbar College of Design, Engineering and Commerce and TJU’s Sidney Kimmel Medical College will keep their names. The school’s mascot, a ram, will also stay on.

Students graduating this semester will get degrees from Philadelphia University.

The schools are currently exploring a new visual identity for the universities, officials said.

The name change appeared inevitable when the schools announced their intention to combine in December 2015. Philadelphia University, the East Falls-based school with a strong history in textile, architecture and design majors, has been plagued with name recognition for years. Philadelphia University is the college’s fourth name in 133 years. Previous names were Philadelphia College of Textiles and Science (known colloquially as Textile,) Philadelphia Textile Institute and Philadelphia Textile School.

The merger will double the new university’s enrollment to around 7,500 students on two campuses — Philadelphia U’s in East Falls and Thomas Jefferson’s medical campus in Center City. The combination has been touted as a complementary match with Philadelphia gaining a medical college and Jefferson adding design and business major opportunities.

Both universities expect the merger to close this summer following regulatory approvals.

Get ready for a “killing wave” sweeping through the Philadelphia region and those on the hit list are all but certain to die if something isn’t done.

The assassin is not who you’d expect and the victims are all around us.

A beetle known as the emerald ash borer with a 99 percent kill rate is attacking Pennsylvania’s millions and millions of ash trees, according to arborists and forestry experts. And as the state’s top forestry manager says, “You have to assume every one of those ash trees is going to die.”

But there is hope, and Pennsylvania’s environmental officials are hard at work to save as many of what could be 1 billion ash trees across the state, according to estimates.

But first, how and when did this bugger of a problem arise?

The emerald ash borer is native to Asia and arrived in the United States as long ago as the late 1980s. It was first discovered feeding on ash trees in the Detroit, Michigan, region in 2002. Experts now believe it was killing ashes for years before that.

How it got to the states is a good question, but it has traveled throughout much of the country in firewood -- the beetle is now found in at least 27 states, and still spreading.

“It’s in virtually every county in Pennsylvania,” said Donald Eggen, the forest health manager for the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR). “It’s been as simple as someone’s ash tree dies, and they say, let’s bring the wood up to the campsite. That’s how it spreads.”

An estimated 306 million ash trees make up four percent of Pennsylvania’s regular forests. (That doesn’t count the millions more in the state’s “urbanized” forests.) About 12 percent, or 37 million ash trees in state forests have already died at the pinchers of the emerald ash borer, which lays its eggs under the bark of the trees. The larva then eat their way along the inner bark and cambium of the tree, which cuts off nutrition and growth.

Within a couple years, an infected ash tree cannot be saved.

“You can’t treat your tree at that point and bring it back to life,” Eggen said.

But, he and local arborists say, there is still hope.

“Eastern Pennsylvania still has a chance,” Eggen said.

Certified arborists like John Verbrugge, of Arader Tree Service in Conshohocken, have been trained to treat ash trees with a pesticide that can protest the trees for two to five years.

Verbrugge, who estimates there are more than 2 million ashes in the Philadelphia region, said it’s worth the cost if homeowners value their mature ash trees. He showed NBC10.com a Lower Merion home’s ash trees and how to treat them. (See the video above.)

But experts like Eggen and Verbrugge agree that treatment must begin ahead of that “killing wave.”

Eggen’s staff at the DCNR already has been working for years with towns to develop municipal-wide plans to manage the beetle insurrection, particularly because dying and dead ash trees also present safety hazards.

“These trees are really brittle when they die,” Eggen said. “You can’t climb one of them to cut from the top down because the branches will break off.”

The state Division of Forest Health is in the midst of studying the ongoing prevention efforts in 10 towns, including West Chester, Philadelphia and Lancaster.

In addition to pesticide treatment, the state spent years in conjunction with the federal government studying the effects a “parasitoid wasp” has on culling the emerald ash borer population, Eggen said.

New tolerant strains of ash trees have also been developed in laboratories in the last decade.

“The beetle is killing 99 percent of the ash trees, so what is happening with the other one percent?” Eggen said. “That’s what we’re looking at.”

It’s not just the loss of beautiful trees in your backyard and nearby parks and the safety issues from millions of trees falling on paths and roads and sidewalks. The ash tree is a part of American culture.

In some areas of the northern Midwest, the black ash tree is sacred to Native Americans. In the large forests of northern Pennsylvania and southern New York, the ash population is cultivated for most of Louisville Slugger’s bats.

“They may have to eventually go to aluminum,” Eggen said of Major League baseball. He wasn’t joking.

NBC10 anchor Tracy Davidson and NBC Sports host Mike Tirico look back on past footage of their time together at WTVH in Syracuse, New Yrok nearly three decades ago.

Running? Cheering on a runner? Watching from the comfort of your couch? We've got everything you could possibly need for Sunday's 10-miler, right here, in one place. 

Before we get to the race (if you're running or not), feel free to check out the 2017 Blue Cross Broad Street Run Health & Wellness Expo presented by Einstein Healthcare Network and get a chance to meet your favorite NBC10 personalities, pick up freebies and learn more about your health. The FREE expo open to the public runs from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Friday and 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday at the Pennsylvania Convention Center, Hall G, on Arch Street in Center City.

NBC10 and Telemundo62 will broadcast the Blue Cross Broad Street Run (so be sure to set your DVR for Sunday morning if you're running)! You can also watch it streamed live on the NBC10 app and on the NBC10 mobile site starting at 7:30 a.m.

Here are some tips for people running the race or watching from home or the side of the road.

Race Day Forecast:

• NBC10 First Alert Neighborhood Weather

Spectator Info:

• Where are the best places to watch the race?

Results (once the race is over):

• Blue Cross Broad Street Run Race Results

A New Jersey man has been arrested for allegedly planning to set off a bomb in New York City in support of ISIS, federal prosecutors said Friday.

Gregory Lepsky, 20, will appear in Newark federal court to face once charge of attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization.

Lepsky was arrested Feb. 21 after a relative called police and said he had threatened to kill the family dog. While being treated for wounds to his arms, Lepsky said he had joined ISIS and had plane tickets to Turkey, according to a criminal complaint.

While searching his home, authorities found a brand new pressure cooker hidden in his closet. 

Lepsky subsequently claimed, while in the hospital, that he had been in contact with ISIS members via Facebook and that he had been studying how to make a pressure cooker bomb with gunpowder, the complaint says. 

"Lepsky also stated that he was going to take the pressure cooker and gunpowder to New York City, bring the items into a crowded area of Manhattan, and blow it up to kill people. Lepsky explained that he would be rewarded in the afterlife for this act," the complaint said. 

Further investigation revealed that Lepsky had multiple conversations on Facebook in which he said he had converted to Islam and wanted to go to Syria to fight non-believers, according to court documents.

A search of his phone turned up a variety of anti-Semitic images, the ISIS flag and a picture of an armed Lepsky dressed in fatigues and making pro-ISIS hand gestures, the complaint says. 

Lepsky is not the first local man to be arrested in recent months for attempting to join ISIS. In March, the FBI arrested a Long Island man who tried to travel to Syria to join the terror group, and last November a Brooklyn resident was arrested with similar plans. 

Lawyer information for Lepsky was not immediately known. He faces a maximum of 20 years in prison on the criminal charge. 

A popular recreational trail running from Philadelphia to the suburbs is getting extended in Montgomery County.

The borough of Pottstown and Montgomery County will join forces to extend the Schuylkill River Trail.

“This new multiuse trail will be built along Industrial Highway between South Washington Street and Moser Road,” a news release about the project said. “Additionally, new signs and pavement markings alerting motorists to be on the lookout for cyclists will be installed on College Drive and Industrial Highway between Keystone Boulevard and South Washington Street.”

The new trail is the first part of a two-phase project to connect the trail with the currently under construction U.S. Route 422 bridge. Once everything is completed, the bridge will include a separate multiuse trail that will allow people to cross over to the Chester County portion of the trail, officials said.

The county hired Lititz-based Flyway Excavating Inc. for just over $1 million to work on the project. The current phase is expected to last from from May 8 to Oct. 12.

This phase of the Pottstown trail construction project includes (per officials):

1. Construction of a new bike and pedestrian crossing at the intersection of Washington Street and Industrial Highway

2. Construction of a multiuse trail between Washington Street and Moser Road (the trail will be constructed within the existing right-of-way on the south side of Industrial Highway)

3. Removal of the existing wire guardrail and replacement with modern W-Beam Steel Guardrail

4. Stabilization of numerous storm sewer outfalls along the stream bank

5. New signage and pavement markings

Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration has renewed its effort to revoke the license of the controversial Berks County Residential Center, which houses undocumented immigrant families detained by the federal government.

The state initially revoked a license to operate the detention facility near Reading in January 2016. But following more than a year of legal wrangling, an administrative judge within the Pennsylvania Department of Human Services ruled last month that the center’s license could be renewed.

The new request comes from the Bureau of Licensing within Human Services and asks that DHS Secretary Ted Dallas personally sign off on the revocation.

Dallas has 30 days to consider the appeal.

The residential center in Leesport is operated by Berks County and paid for by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Bureau.

As of early April, 51 immigrants were housed there, including 27 children. However, that number shrunk this week when a mother and her 5-year-old son were deported to their native Honduras by ICE. The two had been detained at the center since Dec. 18, 2015. ICE said they arrived there after being detained by border agents crossing illegally into the United States.

Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey wrote a letter to the Trump administration earlier this week urging the Department of Homeland Security to free the families held there.

Legal advocates for the woman and children say most at the center fled Central American countries in fear of violence and intimidation and are seeking asylum. A recent appeal by 14 women to the U.S. Supreme Court to hear their cases was denied. The center is one of only three in the country that houses families. The other two are in Texas.

“Gov. Wolf has repeatedly urged the U.S. Departments of Health and Human Services and Homeland Security to consider community-based options to serve these families whenever possible,” the governor’s spokesman J.J. Abbott said in a statement Friday. “He believes that the center should no longer detain these families and his administration continues to pursue the revocation of their state license.”

If Dallas, the state DHS secretary, rules to revoke the center’s license, Berks County could challenge his ruling in Common Pleas Court.

If revocation of a state license to operate were to become permanent, Pennsylvania could not unilaterally shut down the center, according to a source familiar with the operations. However, detainment by ICE would be likely restricted to five days due to previous court settlements, the source said.

The current average stay for the women and children is about 18 months, advocates have said.

The Blue Cross Broad Street Run is nearly here and we have all you need to know for the big race — whether you're running or cheering on a loved one. Join Keith Jones and Erin Coleman for this NBC10 special report.

Pat Bulter, a South Jersey school nurse used fast thinking when she suspected something was wrong with one of her students. NBC10's Cydney Long has the story on the Best School Nurse.

NBC10's Harry Hairston reached out to Jeep and reinstated a mans warranty for his transmission.

It has not been an easy week for students at Cheltenham High School.

A large fight Wednesday morning left staff injured and some students in handcuffs. Videos of the brawl went viral and the incident was covered extensivley by news outlets.

Feeling battered by the negative coverage, a group of students turned to social media to show the internet that Wednesday's fight isn't the Cheltenham they know.

Using the hashtag #thisisCheltenham, people have been sharing positive pictures and posts about the Montgomery County school.

Prosecutors in Montgomery County have launched a homicide investigation after an autopsy determined a man found dead after a Whitpain Township house fire had been stabbed to death.

Won Woo Do's lifeless body was found in the bedroom of his Township Line Road home early Thursday morning. Firefighters discovered the 56-year-old's body after putting out a fire inside the single-story home, prosecutors said.

An autopsy determined Do was stabbed multiple times, prosecutors said. The manner of death was ruled homicide.

Do was the only person home at the time of the fire.

Anyone with information is asked to call Montgomery County detectives at 610-278-3368.