University of Notre Dame

For other universities and colleges named "Notre Dame", see Notre Dame.

The University of Notre Dame IPA: [ ˈnotɚ dem] is a Roman Catholic institution located in Notre Dame, Indiana, immediately northeast of South Bend, Indiana, United States. "Notre Dame," meaning "Our Lady" in French,^[4] refers to the Blessed Virgin Mary. The original and official name of the school is The University of Notre Dame du Lac (the university of Our Lady of the Lake). Notre Dame's picturesque campus sits on 1,250 acres (5 km²) containing two lakes and 136 buildings.

The school was founded on November 26, 1842, by 28-year-old Rev. Edward Sorin, CSC, and six Holy Cross Brothers who were members of the Congregation of Holy Cross, founded in Le Mans, France, in 1837. Recent historical study has shown that the Potawatomi Indians, partly because of the strong faith of Leopold Pokagon, also played an integral role in the founding of Notre Dame both before and during Sorin's presence in Northern Indiana.^[5]

The University's Roman Catholic character is physically manifest throughout the Notre Dame campus. The Basilica of the Sacred Heart is centrally located on campus. A statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary stands atop the Main Building's dome, there are chapels in every residence hall, and crucifixes in most classrooms on campus. 82% of the student body self-identifies as Roman Catholic.

The Indiana General Assembly granted the school its charter on January 15, 1844, under the name University of Notre Dame du Lac. While the translation of the French is "Our Lady of the Lake," the university actually has two lakes on its campus. According to legend, when Father Sorin arrived to found the school, it was November and everything was frozen. He thought there was only one lake and named the university accordingly.

Location

The university is located in north central Indiana about four miles (6 km) from the Michigan state line and north of South Bend, Indiana.

Government

University government is headed by a body of twelve self-perpetuating members called "fellows." Six of the fellows must be priests of the Congregation of Holy Cross (CSC), and the remaining six fellows are laypeople. Three of the priest fellows are always the current university president, the provincial superior of the Indiana Province of the Congregation of Holy Cross, and the local superior of the congregation at Notre Dame. The chairman of the board of trustees is also always a fellow. The rest of the fellows are selected for staggered six-year terms. The fellows meet at least annually and are competent to amend the university's statutes and bylaws and to elect and remove trustees. The board of trustees is much larger than the fellows and currently numbers fifty-seven, composed mostly of laypeople. The board meets tri-annually and is responsible for electing the officers of the university as well as exercising the rest of the corporate powers of the university.

The university president is responsible for the overall administration of the university and is ultimately responsible for the hiring of faculty and staff. The president must always be a priest and a member of the Indiana Province of the Congregation of Holy Cross. The Rev. John Jenkins, CSC, DPhil, is the 17th and current president of the university. He is an associate professor in the department of Philosophy. He succeeded the Rev. Edward Malloy, CSC, PhD on July 1, 2005.

Presidents of the university

There have been seventeen presidents of the University of Notre Dame.^[6]

1. Rev. Edward Sorin, CSC (1841–1865)
2. Rev. Patrick Dillon, CSC (1865–1866)
3. Rev. William Corby, CSC (1866–1872 & 1877–1881)
4. Rev. Auguste Lemonnier, CSC (1872–1874)
5. Rev. Patrick J. Colovin, CSC (1874–1877)
6. Rev. Thomas Walsh, CSC (1881–1893)
7. Rev. Andrew Morrissey, CSC (1893–1905)
8. Rev. John W. Cavanaugh, CSC (1905–1919)
9. Rev. James Burns, CSC (1919–1922)
10. Rev. Matthew Walsh, CSC (1922–1928)
11. Rev. Charles O'Donnell, CSC (1928–1934)
12. Rev. John Francis O'Hara, CSC (1934–1940)
13. Rev. J. Hugh O'Donnell, CSC (1940–1946)
14. Rev. John J. Cavanaugh, CSC (1946–1952)
15. Rev. Theodore Hesburgh, CSC (1952–1987)
16. Rev. Edward Malloy, CSC (1987–2005)
17. Rev. John I. Jenkins, CSC (2005–present)

Academics

Faculty

According to the Bylaws and Academic Articles of the university, the university faculty are grouped into colleges, schools, institutes, and the library system.

Colleges

Established as the university's first and only college in 1842, the College of Arts and Letters is the largest of the four faculty colleges. Housing eighteen departments in the fine arts, the humanities, and the social sciences, the college awards the Bachelor of Arts and the Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in over fifty majors or concentrations. The university's first academic curriculum was modeled after the Jesuit ratio studiorum from Saint Louis University. According to the university website, undergraduate studies in the college offer students "a contemporary version of the traditional liberal arts education." The college also offers graduate studies in most of its departments, typically leading to the PhD, as well as a professional Master of Divinity program.

The science faculty of the university serves as the College of Science. The university first awarded Bachelor of Science degrees in 1865. Today, the College of Science offers curricula leading to the Bachelor of Science, Master of Science, and PhD degrees in the departments of Biological Sciences, Chemistry and Biochemistry, Mathematics, and Physics. It also offers an undergraduate Pre-professional Studies program to prepare college students to study medicine.

The College of Engineering was established as a distinct unit of the University in 1920, although a program in civil engineering was first offered in 1873. The engineering faculty is now organized into the departments of Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering; Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering; Civil Engineering and Geological Sciences; Computer Science and Engineering; and Electrical Engineering; and has curricula leading to Bachelor, Master, and PhD degrees in all those disciplines as well as Environmental Sciences.

Established in 1921, the Mendoza College of Business consists of the university's business faculty. It offers the Bachelor of Business Administration degree with concentrations in Accountancy; Finance and Business Economics; Management; Marketing; and Management Information Systems; and was recently ranked 3rd in the country out of business schools for undergraduates by Business Week. The college also offers professional studies leading to the Master of Business Administration and Master of Science in Accounting degrees and is ranked among the Top Tier MBA schools in the United States by US News and Business Week 2004 rankings. The Mendoza College of Business also offers an extensive executive education program.

Schools

Notre Dame Law School is the body of law scholars at the university. Notre Dame was the first Roman Catholic university in the United States to have a law program, which was started in 1869 and has consistently ranked among the top 25 law schools in the nation over the past decade according to US News and World Report.^[7] Its national program is designed to equip students to practice law in any US jurisdiction. The Law School grants the professional Juris Doctor degree as well as the graduate Master of Laws and Doctor of Juridical Science degrees.

The architecture faculty of the university is organized into the School of Architecture. Courses in architecture were taught at the university as early as 1869, with the School of Architecture offering formal instruction in architecture since 1898. Today, the school offers a five-year undergraduate program leading to the Bachelor of Architecture degree. The program is accredited by the National Architecture Accrediting Board and the curriculum conforms to NAAB requirements for the professional degree in architecture. The school also offers graduate studies leading to the Master of Architecture

Institutes

Many of the faculty of the university participate in one or more of the university's 84 interdisciplinary research institutes and centers. Notable institutes are the Medieval Institute and the Kroc Institute for International Peace studies.^[8].

University libraries

The library faculty of the university are divided into two groups: the University Library system and the Kresge Law Library. The University Library system is the major group of libraries on campus. Its main building is the fourteen-story Theodore M. Hesburgh Library, but it also includes branch libraries for Architecture, Chemistry & Physics, Engineering, the Life Sciences, and Mathematics as well as information centers in the Mendoza College of Business and the Kellogg/Kroc Institute for Peace Studies, and a slide library in O'Shaughnessy Hall. The library system holds 2 million volumes and 2.5 million microform units and subscribes to 22,600 serial publications. The Kresge Law Library, which is the library of the Law School, currently holds 324,000 volumes and 294,000 microform units and subscribes 6,200 serial publications.

Students

According to the university's academic code, students are classified as either undergraduate students, graduate students, or two kinds of professional students: law students or graduate business students. Each group has its own separate student government organization. The administration of the college or school in which a student has a primary course of study serves as his or her academic administrators. There are two exceptions to this rule: first year undergraduate students, whose administration is the First Year of Studies program, and graduate students, whose administration is the Graduate School.

The First Year of Studies program was established in 1962 and is the program to which all incoming first-year students are admitted. Students do not declare a major during this time. Through the structure of the curriculum, the First Year of Studies responds to the uncertainty regarding the choice of college and major that many first-year students experience. The first-year curriculum also accommodates the academic needs of students who have already committed to a specific academic program. The program includes academic advising and a Learning Resource Center, which provides time management, collaborative learning, and learning strategy tutorials as well as subject tutoring. Fifty percent of all freshmen students score between a 31 and 34 on the ACT.

Founded in 1918, the Graduate School is a body whose administrators coordinate master and doctoral studies in the colleges of the university and the School of Architecture. They approve the graduate programs proposed by the academic departments of the colleges and ultimately admit graduate students to studies and confer graduate degrees. The academic departments, though, provide academic and research advising for the students, do most of the admission decision making, and ultimately certify to the Graduate School the readiness of the student for the granting of graduate degrees.

Residence halls

Notre Dame can capacitate up to 6,200 students on campus and undergraduate students live in 27 single-sex residence halls, each with its own distinct subculture as well as its own chapel inside. Notre Dame, like many other Roman Catholic or Christian schools, enforces a visitation policy (known as parietals) on those students who live in dormitories, specifying times when members of the opposite sex are allowed to visit. The dorms are located on five quads: North Quad, South Quad, West Quad, Mod Quad, and God Quad. According to the Office of Residence Life and Housing (known as ResLife), 80% of undergraduates live on campus.^[9]

There are no Greek sorority/fraternity societies on campus; many students continue in the same residence hall for all four years. This dorm loyalty coupled with the competitive nature of Notre Dame students makes for some very fierce interhall rivalries. Furthermore, Notre Dame is the only university (besides the service academies) to offer full contact, full pads, intramural football. Alongside a prevalent campuswide sports obsession, the interhall football program was a contributing factor in Sports Illustrated ranking Notre Dame as the #2 "Jock School" in the country in 1997.^[10]

Reputation

Academics

• The University of Notre Dame is 20th in the 2007 U.S. News and World Report "National Universities" ranking for undergraduate studies.^[11]
• Notre Dame's Mendoza College of Business is ranked 3rd Nationally for undergraduates.^[12]
• Notre Dame's undergraduate School of Architecture is ranked 12th Nationally.
• Notre Dame's Law School is tied for 22nd (with Boston University, Iowa, and Washington & Lee) in the 2007 U.S. News and World Report rankings for "America's Best Graduate Schools 2007".^[7] Founded in 1869, the Notre Dame Law School is the oldest Roman Catholic law school in the United States. The Notre Dame Law program aims to educate men and women to become lawyers of extraordinary professional competence. Its national program is designed to equip students to practice law in any jurisdiction.^[13]
• MCOB's Master's Program in Accountancy is ranked 4th by the industry-affiliated Public Accounting Report.^[14]
• Notre Dame's graduate program in philosophy is ranked 13th Nationally.^[15]
• The University of Notre Dame is the highest ranked Roman Catholic-affiliated National University for Undergraduate Studies in the U.S. News survey.

Financial

• Notre Dame's endowment has grown to approximately $5.5 billion as of the 2006 fiscal year, placing it among the 18 largest educational endowments in the country.^[16]

Other

• Hispanic Magazine ranks Notre Dame ninth on its list of the top 25 colleges for Latinos.
• Notre Dame reserves 21 to 24 percent of admissions spots for legacy (children of alumni) students.^[17]
• Princeton Review 2007 edition of the 361 Best Colleges it ranks University of Notre Dame as the number 1 for schools in which an “Alternative Life is not an Alternative.”^[18]

• Notre Dame was ranked last by Trojan, the condom company in terms of access to sexual information it provides its students^[19]

Athletics

Main article: Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Notre Dame athletic teams are known as the Fighting Irish (though students are called "Domers"). Previously, and especially during the Knute Rockne football era, Notre Dame had several unofficial nicknames—among them the "Rovers" and the "Ramblers," because of those teams' propensity to travel the nation to play its football contests, such as at the University of Southern California, long before such national travel became the collegiate norm. Later, Notre Dame was also, again unofficially, known as the "Terriers," after the Irish breed of the dog, and for some years, an Irish Terrier would be found on the ND football sidelines.

Notre Dame's nickname is inherited from Irish immigrant soldiers who fought in the Civil War with New York City's Irish Brigade, recollected among other places in the poetry of Joyce Kilmer who served with one of the Irish Brigade regiments during World War I. Though the Irish regiments and Kilmer were well-known, particularly in the urban ethnic community, during the era between the Civil War and World War II, Notre Dame's claim to the nickname is justified since its third president was a famous Irish Brigade chaplain whose ministrations at Gettysburg are commemorated in the "Absolution Under Fire," part of Notre Dame's permanent art collection.

The most generally accepted explanation is that the press coined the nickname as a characterization of Notre Dame teams in the 1920s as a result of preexisting Irish stereotypes, the widely reported events of 1924, and the grit, determination, and tenacity of Coach Knute Rockne's football teams of the era. Although Notre Dame alumnus Francis Wallace popularized it in his New York Daily News columns in the 1920s with respect to the university, as early as the Civil War Father Corby and the Irish Brigade of the Union Army had been dubbed "The Fighting Irish."^{[citation needed]}

The University of Notre Dame is most notably known for its exceptional football program. Regarded as one of the greatest college football dynasties in history, the Fighting Irish have won 11 consensus national championships and produced 7 Heisman Trophy winners. Some notable football greats are Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Montana, Hall of Fame and Heisman Trophy winning running back Paul Hornung, as well as future Hall of Famers such as wide receiver Tim Brown (the last member of the Fighting Irish to win the Heisman Trophy) and running back Jerome Bettis. The Fighting Irish are synonymous with their coaches, a number of whom have become legends based on their outstanding won-loss records achieved while coaching the team, most notably Knute Rockne, Frank Leahy, Ara Parseghian, and Lou Holtz.

In 2007, Notre Dame played LSU in the Sugar Bowl where they lost to the Tigers.

See also

• List of University of Notre Dame alumni
• Notre Dame Victory March
• Notre Dame, Our Mother
• Stepan Center

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