Even after accounting for demographic variables (gender, race/ethnicity, parental educational attainment), researchers found that undergraduate students who reported greater pandemic-induced stress tended to have greater test anxiety and were less confident in their computer skills.
Dinah Lawan won the 2022 Gary F. Barnabo Political Science Writing Prize for the best paper about a current national or global issue that provides a plan for specific action and a nonviolent resolution. Lawan recommended a peacebuilding approach to effectively dismantle Boko Haram, which has has killed more than 350,000 people in Nigeria.
The Illinois resident became interested in studying Chinese when her aunt moved to Beijing to report on the 2008 Olympics. Margaret Rauch thrived in her ND Chinese language classes, completing the highest level in her sophomore year. She then took Classical Chinese and designed an independent research project—three semesters of directed readings that examined Su Xuelin, a May Fourth Intellectual who converted to Catholicism and wrote horny Heart.
Irma Ibarra, who spoke Spanish and English when she arrived in South Bend, majored in Italian, studied in Rome, took Beginning French, and wishes she had taken a Portuguese course. Studying French helped Kyle Dorshorst gain a deeper appreciation of French music, literature, art, and culture. Maria Teel loved that her language skills could bridge gaps between people, including at the Mandela Washington Fellowship for Young African Leaders. When Fouad El Zoghbi came to Notre Dame, he spoke French, English, and Arabic. Then he studied Spanish. Learning a new language, he said, expands your mind in unimaginable ways.
The College of Arts & Letters had 22 students selected as finalists for the 2022-23 Fulbright U.S. Student Program. Established in 1946, the Fulbright U.S. Student Program is the U.S. government’s flagship international exchange program, assisting graduate and undergraduate students with pursuing graduate study, teaching English or researching abroad.
The Office of the Provost presented Kimberly Belcher, Ann-Marie Conrado, Blake Leyerle, Forrest Spence, and Michael Macaluso with Joyce Awards for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching and presented Maureen Dawson with a Dockweiler Award for outstanding advising.
Congratulations to the Class of 2022! This video, screened at the Arts and Letters Diploma Ceremony, features several seniors reflecting on their time at Notre Dame and in the College of Arts and Letters. “Your peers, your professors, everybody wants you to be the best version of yourself that you can be,” said political science and Latino studies major Matheo Vidal. “There is no place like Notre Dame, and I'm just so thankful that I was blessed to be able to experience it.”
It didn’t take long for Graham “Mac” Ryan to figure out what he wanted to study at Notre Dame. After just one conversation during a campus visit and hearing about the economics major and the philosophy, politics, and economics minor, he knew those were the programs for him. Determining how he wanted to use those professionally, though, was going to take some time. So Ryan decided to make the most of his summers figuring that out.
When the COVID-19 pandemic suddenly halted international travel, Mary Shiraef’s fieldwork plan to investigate the outcomes of communist-era border policies in Albania was postponed indefinitely. So she pivoted.The Notre Dame political science doctoral candidate decided to map pandemic-induced border closures around the world. Two years later, the project has been reported on in more than 40 news outlets, the data was peer-reviewed and published in the Nature Portfolio’s Scientific Data, Scientific Reports published the open-source results, and the National Library of Medicine posted the study. The international research collaboration is still active and continues to provide valuable skills-development opportunities for Notre Dame undergraduates.
What do studio art, German, history, fairy tales, and subverting gender tropes have in common? Notre Dame undergraduate Naya Tadavarthy has used all of them in creating her senior thesis project. Tadavarthy’s wide range of academic interests have now culminated in a perfect ending — she’s writing and illustrating a children’s book about German author Gisela von Arnim, who was creating protofeminist fairytales as a teenager in the 1840s, at a time when the world lacked female-focused literary figures.
Mikaela Ramsey has wanted to be an educator since she first set foot in a classroom at age 5. Since enrolling at Notre Dame, she’s been preparing for that career in the classroom. And far beyond. For Ramsey, now a senior, that preparation has included majoring in sociology and concentrating in Spanish. To gain additional knowledge, skills, and experience, she’s taken courses in the education, schooling, and society program and she was an Alliance for Catholic Education intern.
The juniors, chosen from among nearly 900 applicants nationwide, are Notre Dame's second and third Phi Beta Kappa Key into Public Service Scholars. They'll each receive a $5,000 undergraduate scholarship. Miguel Coste is a neuroscience and behavior major in the College of Arts and Letters from Tampa, Florida. Noelle Dana is a classics and philosophy major, with a concentration in philosophy, science and mathematics, and a business economics and Hesburgh Program in Public Service minor from Hampden, Maine.
University of Notre Dame alumnus Charles Sheedy and his wife, Ellen, have made a leadership gift to his alma mater to endow an innovative new program that will offer specialized coursework, programming and resources for undergraduate students interested in finding deeper meaning in the practice of business through the liberal arts. The Sheedy Family Program in Economy, Enterprise and Society will be open to College of Arts and Letters students with a minor in business economics or a Mendoza College of Business minor, or Mendoza majors who have a major, supplemental major, or minor in the College of Arts and Letters.
French majors pursue their passions while developing skills such as language proficiency, intercultural competence, critical thinking, and analysis. “Learning a language really expands your understanding of the world and the way that the world works together, but also gives you a skill that you'll be able to use in the future in almost any context," said Maria Teel. "French is such a beautiful language and so I really love learning it."
Josiah Broughton started off as a computer science major at Notre Dame, but the courses didn’t align with his interests or strengths. So he stepped back, re-evaluated, and chose to take a more creative route — majoring in film, television, and theatre. The classes, he said, are fascinating and fun and offer a more comprehensive perspective on the concepts involved in video game design, from story and structure to character and graphics. Now, his dream of being a game designer is a lot closer to reality now thanks to coursework on 3D digital production for animation and video games, creating film as social action, elements of computing, and scriptwriting.
Lily Barth has written a children’s story about her dog in Japanese and is working on a creative art project and history lesson in which she'll recreate ancient ornate fans that were used in courting with her Japanese poems. Barth particularly enjoys her First Year Japanese II course. “It’s just one of those classes that I wake up excited about every day."
After a week in London, Eoghan Fay had a suitcase full of souvenirs, a legal pad full of notes, and a head full of memories. Next semester, he'll work on his capstone project using the research from his trip, which was made possible by a Spring Break 2022 Research Grant from the Nanovic Institute for European Studies.
Godiya Simon came to Notre Dame needing to learn a language in order to be successful. Now, she’s headed to an elite graduate program in part because of her work to ensure another language never goes extinct. Simon didn’t know just how rare her native language of Kibaku was until a conversation one day with her linguistic anthropology professor — a realization that inspired her to create a cross-continental multimedia effort to preserve and document it. In the process, she’s written a senior thesis, created a children’s book, spent a summer in Hawaii learning research skills, presented at a conference, and developed a clear vision for her post-graduate goals.
Trevor Lwere is completing a senior thesis titled, "Growth and/or Development: Africa's Experience with Modernity." He plans to pursue a master’s in global affairs as a Schwarzman Scholar in Beijing, China.
Arabic majors pursue their passions while developing skills such as language proficiency, intercultural competence, critical thinking, and analysis. "In addition to just the language requirement, you're also getting a feel for the culture, the literature classes on the modern Middle East, and Middle Eastern politics," said Natalie Armbruster. "You will be amazed how quickly you really do learn this."
Whether you are a performer, a creative person, or just a fan, Notre Dame’s musical theatre minor gives students the opportunity to perform, direct, compose, and create theatrical works in a collaborative, hands-on program. While many undergraduates come to the minor wanting to pursue a career in theatre, most of the students have other career plans. The program will help them grow in a variety of ways, Hawkins said, including in risk-taking, developing an aggressive curiosity, and “just walking a little bit taller when you walk out of class.”
The University of Notre Dame is among the top producers of Fulbright Program students for the eighth consecutive year, according to the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, which administers the Fulbright Program on behalf of the U.S. Department of State. Among research institutions, the University finished second with 26 Fulbright recipients for the 2021-22 academic year, tied with Georgetown and Harvard and ahead of Princeton, Columbia, Stanford, and Yale.
Among Notre Dame's 26 recipients were 20 Arts & Letters undergraduates, graduate students, and alumni — meaning the College of Arts & Letters produced more Fulbright winners than Penn, the University of Chicago, Michigan, Northwestern, New York University, Johns Hopkins, MIT, and Duke.
James Rudolph’s creative exercises can be measured in movement — from surgical robots making precise actions while replacing knees and hips to a handheld device that determines whether cancer treatment is working without breaking the skin. In his work, the Notre Dame assistant professor of industrial design is focused on discovering important problems in order to create a better future, a mindset he maintains in the classroom, where his students are designing everything from marketable products to physical environments to artistic experiences.
Notre Dame’s College of Arts & Letters is launching a new selective program that will offer specialized coursework, programming, and resources for undergraduates interested in finding deeper meaning in the practice of business through the liberal arts. The Sheedy Family Program in Economy, Enterprise & Society is a rigorous academic experience and collaborative community focused on helping students form strong bonds as they engage in exclusive classes, independent research, meaningful dialogue, and purpose-driven career discernment. The cohort-based program is open to Arts & Letters students with a minor in business economics or a Mendoza College of Business minor, or Mendoza majors who have a major, supplemental major, or minor in Arts & Letters.
Italian majors pursue their passions while developing skills such as language proficiency, intercultural competence, critical thinking, and analysis. "You realize that you're not only speaking a different language, but you're thinking in a completely different way, and it teaches you to really be able to express yourself really well," said Italian major Erik Verhey.
Two groups of Notre Dame students — one affiliated with the Washington Program and the other with the nonpartisan Student Policy Network — did significant research on allegations against two Maltese officials and the daughter of the former Angolan president, which they submitted to the Departments of State and Treasury in 2020. It's rare for undergraduates to be involved in such significant legal work — and in December, the State Department issued sanctions against all three officials the Notre Dame students spent an "immense amount of time" researching.
German majors pursue their passions while developing skills such as language proficiency, cultural empathy, communication, and analysis. "The really cool thing about the German major is how variable the classes are and how customizable they are, too," said Andrew Fulwider, a German major at Notre Dame. "You can take history classes, literature classes, arts classes, and current events classes."
In the early days of the pandemic, when students of all ages were learning at home, Notre Dame senior Renee Yaseen noticed how much her 10-year-old brother, Daniel, missed his friends. Since they couldn’t get together to play, they played online games — for hours. So she started brainstorming ways to help him be more physically active while safely and meaningfully interacting with his friends online. The result: FriendOver, a startup that is harnessing computer vision technology (artificial intelligence that enables computers to process images and videos in the way people do) and machine learning to promote goodness in gaming.
Andrew Burke, who researches differential topology and is writing a senior thesis on algebraic geometry, has taken immersive coursework in mathematics, including graduate-level classes during his junior and senior years. Outside of the classroom, Burke is an offensive analyst for the Notre Dame football team and volunteers with Riverbend Math Circles.
For 75 minutes every fall Tuesday afternoon, junior Grace Ryan steps, slides, marches, smiles, and laughs. The business analytics major who’s pursuing a career in aerospace was hesitant to sign up for an Irish dance course given her already busy schedule, but she eventually agreed to try it out. Now she’s hooked — and that combination of having fun while becoming proficient in Irish traditions is exactly why the Department of Irish Language and Literature began offering 1-credit old-style Irish dancing [course] and tin whistle courses this year.