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Faculty Stories

Faculty at Notre Dame come from communities and cultures all over the world. They conduct research and scholarship on topics and issues that span numerous academic disciplines. They share with students not just their areas of expertise but also their questions and concerns about the enduring issues and latest developments that shape our times.

But their role in broadening and sharpening the lenses through which we understand ourselves and the world around us extend well beyond individual research projects, classroom lectures, course syllabi, or a list of academic programs.

The selection of stories below helps illustrate the many other ways Notre Dame faculty foster diversity, support inclusion, and enliven the entire Notre Dame community.

ND Expert: Hong Kong movement unlike any other

Shannon Roddel

Hong Kong marked China’s National Day (Oct. 1) in unprecedented fashion, as pro-democracy protesters crowded the streets of the Asian financial hub for what is being called a critical day in the territory’s “Umbrella Revolution.” University of Notre Dame political scientist and Hong Kong native Victoria Hui has worked in the democracy movement there. She says it is unlike any...

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STEM day camp for elementary school girls

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For the inaugural GE Girls @ Notre Dame summer camp, local fifth- through ninth-graders spent a week on campus launching rockets, building hovercraft and making robots dance. The day camp, which takes place on college campuses around the country, is designed to introduce middle school girls to STEM activities, with the goal of encouraging them to pursue careers in science...

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Notre Dame theologians explore life, death and resurrection in Rwanda

Michael O. Garvey

Watch video The genocide in Rwanda, whose 20th anniversary is being observed worldwide this month, began only a few days after Easter. That the hatred that cost the lives of a million people in this overwhelmingly Christian country could be unleashed so near to Holy Week seems paradoxical, ironic or even blasphemous.

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Italian architect Pier Carlo Bontempi to receive 2014 Driehaus Prize in Chicago

Notre Dame News

Italian architect Pier Carlo Bontempi will receive the 2014 Richard H. Driehaus Prize from the University of Notre Dame at a ceremony to be held on March 29 (Saturday) at the John B. Murphy Memorial Auditorium in Chicago. Bontempi’s award-winning international work includes a block recovery plan in Parma’s historical center, as well as the Place de Toscane and the...

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Panel discussion on role of Catholic Church in marriage debate to be held at Notre Dame

Michael O. Garvey

A panel discussion on the role of the Catholic Church in the cultural and political debate about marriage will take place at 7 p.m. Monday (March 17) in DeBartolo Hall, Room 101, on the campus of the University of Notre Dame. The discussion, “Marriage, the Church and the Common Good,” is sponsored by Notre Dame’s Center for Ethics and Culture...

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Notre Dame awarded U.S. Department of State grant to train young African leaders

Notre Dame News

As part of the Notre Dame Initiative for Global Development (NDIGD), a group of collaborators at the University of Notre Dame has received a grant from the U.S. Department of State to train young African leaders in entrepreneurship. The collaborators include the University of Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business Nonprofit Executive Program, the Kellogg Institute for International Studies’ Ford...

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Panel discussion to feature three leading scholars on Latino voting patterns

Arnel Bulaoro

Three of the nation’s leading scholars on Latino voting patterns will participate in a panel discussion titled “American Politics in the 21st Century: The Latino Vote and the 2014 Elections” at 7 p.m. Wednesday (Feb. 5) at the University of Notre Dame’s McKenna Hall Auditorium. The event is sponsored by Multicultural Student Programs and Services’ Building Bridges Lecture Series, the...

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Venezuelan maestro receives final Notre Dame Prize for Distinguished Public Service in Latin America

Elizabeth Rankin

Visionary music educator José Antonio Abreu was awarded the final Notre Dame Prize for Distinguished Public Service in Latin America at a private campus ceremony on Sept. 22 in recognition of his extraordinary work fighting poverty and violence and developing whole, successful young people through classical music.

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Video: Peter Casarella on the future of Latino theology

Todd Boruff

“I want to try a new step forward in Mestizo Christianity, looking at cultural dialogue and cultural difference that brings the traditions from the past … into conversation with Latino theology,” said Peter Casarella, associate professor of theology at the University of Notre Dame and a fellow at the University’s Institute for Latino Studies.

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Kerry Ann Rockquemore to speak at Notre Dame Graduate School Commencement

William G. Gilroy

Kerry Ann Rockquemore, who received her doctorate in sociology from the University of Notre Dame in 1999, will deliver the address at the University’s Graduate School Commencement Ceremony at 10 a.m. May 17 (Saturday) in the Compton Family Ice Arena. While a graduate student, Rockquemore won both the John J. Kane Memorial Award for the most outstanding graduate student in...

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Peter Woo named recipient of Indiana Campus Compact student community commitment award

John Guimond

Senior Peter Woo, Class of 2014, a Hesburgh-Yusko Scholar and a finance and philosophy major with a minor in Chinese at the University of Notre Dame, has been named the recipient of the Indiana Campus Compact (ICC) 2014 Richard J. Wood Student Community Commitment Award. The annual award recognizes the efforts of students from an Indiana college or university for...

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South Africa’s ambassador to the U.S. to deliver 20th annual Hesburgh Lecture in Ethics and Public Policy

Joan Fallon

Ebrahim Rasool, South Africa’s ambassador to the United States, will deliver the 20th annual Rev. Theodore M. Hesburgh, C.S.C., Lecture in Ethics and Public Policy at 4 p.m. April 8 (Tuesday) in the Hesburgh Center for International Studies Auditorium at the University of Notre Dame. Rasool’s lecture, “Relic of the Past or Template for the Future: Nelson Mandela’s Impact on...

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Fulbright foreign language teachers introduced to American culture at Notre Dame

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The University of Notre Dame is hosting its ninth Fulbright Foreign Language Teaching Assistant (FLTA) orientation for the upcoming academic year. Sixty teachers from 28 countries, representing 15 languages, are staying on campus Aug. 9-13 (Saturday-Wednesday) and will attend a series of workshops designed to enhance their teaching in the United States.

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Grant propels largest growth of Notre Dame Haiti Program’s salt operations

Marissa Gebhard

The Notre Dame Haiti Program at the University of Notre Dame has received a large, anonymous grant that will support the growth of its salt program, which produces clean, co-fortified salt, intended to eliminate lymphatic filariasis and combat iodine deficiency disorder. The $375,000 grant will be matched by other donations and, in conjunction with several other resources, will fund the...

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The ministry of storytelling

Michael O. Garvey

The Catholic Church is the largest of the Christian churches in the nation, and more than half of the Catholics in the United States who are under the age of 25 are Latinos. Barring massive changes in birthrates and immigration, a majority of American Catholics will be Latinos by the year 2050. If the rise of Latino Catholics confronts the...

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Rev. Ray Hammond to replace Patten as Notre Dame’s commencement speaker

Dennis Brown

Rev. Dr. Ray Hammond, founder of Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Boston, will deliver the principal address at the University of Notre Dame’s 169th University Commencement Ceremony on May 18 (Sunday), replacing the previously announced speaker, Christopher Patten, chancellor of Oxford and chair of the BBC Trust. Patten informed the University this week that he is withdrawing from several...

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Notre Dame to award 7 honorary degrees at Commencement

Brendan O’Shaughnessy

Six distinguished figures in business, the Church, community leadership, education, engineering and the performing arts will join principal speaker Christopher Patten as honorary degree recipients at the University of Notre Dame’s 169th University Commencement Ceremony on May 18 (Sunday). The ceremony will be held in the morning at Notre Dame Stadium in order to accommodate as many guests as possible....

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Ruan Yisan to receive 2014 Henry Hope Reed Award in Chicago

Notre Dame News

Ruan Yisan, historic preservationist and professor of architecture at Tongji University, will receive the 2014 Henry Hope Reed Award on March 29 (Saturday) at the John B. Murphy Memorial Auditorium in Chicago. Ruan will receive the award in conjunction with the Richard H. Driehaus Prize ceremony, at which the Driehaus Prize will be presented to Italian architect Pier Carlo Bontempi.

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Two prominent South African anti-apartheid participants to speak at Notre Dame

Elizabeth Rankin

Two prominent South African participants in the anti-apartheid struggle will speak at the University of Notre Dame on Wednesday (March 19) and April 3 (Thursday) as part of the Africa Working Group’s “Celebrating Nelson Mandela” series. One a liberation theologian and political activist, the other the “Jackie Robinson of South Africa,” they each played a crucial role in moving their...

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San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro to address Latino civic engagement

Arnel Bulaoro

San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro will visit the University of Notre Dame campus at 7 p.m. April 7 (Monday) in DeBartolo Hall, Room 101, for an event titled “American Politics in the 21st Century: Latino Civic Engagement.” Joining the mayor on stage will be his former Stanford faculty mentor Luis Fraga. The two will discuss the mayor’s journey into the...

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Notre Dame to honor Martin Luther King Jr. with prayer service, community events

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Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C., president of the University of Notre Dame, will preside at a prayer service to honor the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. from 11:45 a.m. to 12:15 p.m. Monday (Jan. 20) in the Rotunda of the Main Building. The public is invited to participate in the prayer service and the reception that will immediately follow.

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