“One of the great things about philosophy is that we’re able to study a lot of big questions that we kind of take for granted and really look into why we do certain things and does it make sense,” says Ellen Carroll ’13, a philosophy major and philosophy, politics, and economics minor from Portsmouth, R.I.
“After graduating Notre Dame, would I have ever said, ‘Oh, I’m gonna be a TV writer in Hollywood?’ Never in a million years,” says Linda Gase, a Notre Dame graduate with a degree in English. She is currently co-executive producer of Switched at Birth, a one-hour drama on ABC Family. Gase has also written for ER, The District, Crossing Jordan, and Army Wives. She credits her strength as a writer to the time she spent at Notre Dame developing her critical thinking skills and examining her point of view. “The biggest challenge of a writer is to trust your voice, and I feel that at Notre Dame, I really honed my voice.”
Structural equation modeling and factor analysis might be difficult concepts to grasp for most people outside the world of statistics, but one thing should be crystal clear: Professor Ke-Hai Yuan’s groundbreaking work in these areas is a driving force behind the nationally recognized success of the quantitative psychology program in Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letters.
“As a clinical student, I can especially attest to the excellent training that I’ve received through that area,” says Allison Gaffey, a fourth-year student in the clinical psychology Ph.D. program at the University of Notre Dame. She also appreciates the Department of Psychology’s “very strong” quantitative program, allowing her to gain additional training in those methods.
Notre Dame economist Kirk Doran has been awarded the 2013 Albert Rees Prize for his dissertation, which focused on child labor in rural Mexico. The Rees prize is awarded every two years for a Princeton Ph.D. dissertation, completed within the past six years, judged to have made the greatest contribution to labor economics.
Large crowds can make finding someone on a college campus, while tailgating, or at a concert nearly impossible. But a new app created by a team of Notre Dame students could soon change that. English and computer applications double major Nicole Brooks used knowledge from both of her fields of study to help turn a friend’s practical idea into a mobile app called Beacon.
The University of Notre Dame Initiative for Global Development (NDIGD) was recently awarded a $375,000 contract from the Millennium Challenge Corp. (MCC) to conduct an evaluation of MCC’s water project in Ghana. Among the many faculty involved in the project is Joseph Kaboski, the David F. and Erin M. Seng Foundation Professor of Economics in the College of Arts and Letters.
Notre Dame’s Department of Economics has bolstered its strengths in development economics and healthcare policy with two new hires, who bring with them the invaluable experience of being advised by major figures in the field. Assistant Professor Kevin Donovan comes to Notre Dame from Arizona State University where his faculty adviser was Nobel laureate Edward Prescott, while Assistant Professor Ethan Lieber’s adviser at the University of Chicago was Steven Levitt, winner of the John Bates Clark Medal and author of Freakonomics.
The pre-school years are the most formative for young brains. Notre Dame Psychologist Kristin Valentino sees both the promise and vulnerability of children at this stage of life. That’s why Valentino, the William J. Shaw Center for Children and Families Assistant Professor of Psychology, developed an intervention program designed to improve communication between mothers and maltreated preschoolers and, ultimately, lead to happier, healthier families.
“I felt like my background at Notre Dame could not have prepared me better,” says Constance Barker ’73, a commissioner for the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission in Washington, D.C.
The University of Notre Dame ranks fifth nationwide in percentage of undergraduate students participating in study abroad programs among U.S. doctoral/research institutions, according to the Open Doors report released Monday, November 11 by the Institute of International Education (IIE).
Rev. John S. Dunne, C.S.C., John A. O’Brien Professor of Theology at the University of Notre Dame, died early Monday, November 11 at Holy Cross House after a long struggle with complications of a head injury sustained in July. He was 83. “On behalf of the University, I extend my deepest condolences to the family and friends of Father John S. Dunne, a beloved teacher, scholar, priest, and friend,” said Notre Dame President Rev. John I. Jenkins, C.S.C.
Timothy J. Roemer, former U.S. ambassador to India, will give a lecture titled “Twitter, Buffett, and Darwin: India and the United States Relationship,” at 4 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 13 in the Jordan Auditorium of the University of Notre Dame’s Mendoza College of Business. The event is free and open to the public. The lecture, which is co-sponsored by the Liu Institute for Asia and Asian Studies and the Kellogg Institute for International Studies, is part of the Liu Institute’s Distinguished Speaker Series and Notre Dame International’s International Education Week.
The Miami Dolphins’ recent suspension of Richie Incognito in the wake of allegations that his bullying of football teammate Jonathan Martin constituted “conduct detrimental to the team” should renew and intensify opposition to hazing throughout the National Football League, according to F. Clark Power, professor in the University of Notre Dame’s Program of Liberal Studies, concurrent professor in the Department of Psychology, and fellow in the Notre Dame’s Institute for Educational Initiatives.
Joyelle McSweeney, associate professor in Notre Dame’s Department of English recently won the inaugural Leslie Scalapino Award for Innovative Women Playwrights for her new play, Dead Youth, or, the Leaks.
In a collaborative effort with Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letters, College of Engineering Professor Paul McGinn led a team that recently adapted a 3-D printer for ceramics projects in the Department of Art, Art History, and Design.
The prevalence of HIV and AIDS in South Africa is an issue that continues to define the country and its citizens. It is estimated that more than six million South Africans live with HIV/AIDS. This is more cases than any other country in the world. In spring 2013, Robert Sedlack ’89, associate professor in Notre Dame’s Department of Art, Art History, and Design, traveled with a team of 11 students to Johannesburg, South Africa to gain first-hand perspective on the problem and collaborate with South African community organizations.
An ambitious international research effort to illuminate why democracies around the world succeed or fail has been awarded approximately $5.8 million over six years by the Swedish foundation Riksbankens Jubileumsfond. The Varieties of Democracy project, based in the U.S. at the University of Notre Dame’s Kellogg Institute for International Studies and in Europe at the University of Gothenburg’s Varieties of Democracy Institute, promises to make entirely new kinds of democracy research and policy assessment possible by quantifying democracy in all countries from 1900 to the present.
When Caitlin Myron ’13 first came to Notre Dame she had an interest in the Irish culture from her childhood, but never imagined it was something she would have the opportunity to study. Four years later, she is beginning a master’s degree in Modern Irish at the National University of Ireland.