From Aug. 10 to 14, ECG’s inaugural Graduate Ethics Bootcamp brought together all 12 graduate gellows — five Wilsey Distinguished Graduate Fellows and seven Tech Ethics Graduate Fellows — whose fields span the social sciences, engineering, computer science, and the humanities. The bootcamp was led by Megan McDermott, director of the Notre Dame-IBM Technology Ethics Lab, and Jeffrey Tolly, associate director of education and student research at ECG, with daily input from Meghan Sullivan, director of ECG and the Notre Dame Ethics Initiative, and Wilsey Family College Professor of Philosophy.

The week included interactive seminars that offered an overview of three major moral theories — utilitarianism, rule-based ethics, and virtue ethics — and invited the fellows to engage these theories in dialogue with the tools of their own discipline.

A centerpiece of the week, the bootcamp capstone project involved breaking the fellows out into four-person cohorts to review the “Claude Constitution,” an 84-page document published by frontier artificial intelligence lab Anthropic, that the company says “sets the core values, safety rules, and ethical reasoning framework” for all Claude AI models. Fellows were asked to read the constitution twice and work in their small groups to propose amendments for their peers to consider.

"There's no better way to explore how moral theory applies to the complexities of real life than by carefully investigating a current use case that touches on several disciplines and spheres of life,” said Tolly. “Claude's Constitution proved to be just that, as we were so encouraged to see how this exercise pushed our graduate fellows into deeper self-reflection and critical examination of the moral stakes involved with designing powerful AI."

Emelia Hughes, current Technology Ethics Graduate Fellow and doctoral candidate in computer science at Notre Dame, found the exercise useful for helping to broaden her own initial reactions to the constitution, and helping her wrestle with her own knee-jerk reactions to its language and assumptions. She found herself challenged by a philosophy student in her group to really spend time entertaining questions about Claude’s consciousness or lack thereof, and potential implications of either assumption.

“Throughout the bootcamp, it was really interesting to encounter others at this moment where we’re all so deep in our own areas and knowledge fields, and to realize that we can collaborate despite our differences,” said Hughes. “Oftentimes exercises like this are surface level enough that you don’t actually share knowledge, but reviewing the constitution gave us a chance to go deep into each other’s fields and teach each other.”

Each group had a chance to present their proposed amendments to the full graduate cohort on Aug. 24, with proposals addressing wide-ranging questions raised by the rapid development of artificial intelligence and the Claude constitution in particular. Proposed amendments suggested broadening Claude’s understandings of harm, asking for clarity in how the model weighs conflicting values, wrestling with the moral implications of Claude being programmed to be maximally helpful, and advocating for more honesty and transparency from frontier AI labs.

In the end, the bootcamp laid the foundation for important interdisciplinary collaboration among fellows to continue throughout the coming academic year, and gave fellows the tools to begin thinking about how best to address critical ethical issues in their own academic arenas.

“I immediately realized that if I needed guidance on particularities of deep theory or cognitive science there were people and resources to go to,” said Westin Smith, Ph.D. candidate in Spanish at Notre Dame. “Everyone added their own flavor to our discussions on Claude, and that really helped illuminate how multifaceted these questions are. At the end of the day, everyone’s trying to grapple with big questions, and it’s fun to be able to help each other.”

The Notre Dame–IBM Technology Ethics Lab — a critical component of the Institute for Ethics and the Common Good and the Notre Dame Ethics Initiative — promotes interdisciplinary research and policy leadership in technology ethics and is supported by a $20 million investment from IBM.

The Wilsey Distinguished Graduate Fellows are drawn from the College of Arts & Letters, bringing humanistic and social scientific perspectives to bear on complex moral questions. The 2026–27 cohort of Wilsey Distinguished Graduate Fellows is supported by a John Templeton Foundation grant, aimed at developing love-based ethical frameworks.

Originally published by Hannah Heinzekehr at ethics.nd.edu on September 10, 2026.

“25 Years After 9/11” will bring together four distinguished members of the Notre Dame community and beyond to reflect on their personal experiences of September 11 and the lasting significance of that day for American civic life: U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh; Rev. Edward A. “Monk” Malloy, C.S.C., president emeritus of the University of Notre Dame; Jennie Bradley Lichter, Notre Dame alumna and senior advisor to the March for Life Education and Defense Fund; and James J. “Jimmy” Dunne III, Notre Dame trustee and vice chairman and senior managing principal of Piper Sandler. The conversation will be moderated by Vincent Phillip Muñoz, director of the Center for Citizenship and Constitutional Government.

The conversation will offer an opportunity not only to remember the nearly 3,000 people who lost their lives, but also to consider what 9/11 means for America. Drawing on the panelists’ personal experiences of the day itself and their careers in law, higher education, public service and business, the conversation will explore how September 11 continues to shape our understandings of citizenship, solidarity, sacrifice, and leadership — and what those experiences might teach a new generation about the responsibilities of life in a constitutional democracy.

“Twenty-five years after September 11, we have an opportunity to remember the lives that were lost, recall the extraordinary acts of courage and selflessness that were displayed, and also to ask what 9/11 teaches us about our responsibilities to one another and to our country,” said Muñoz. “At the Center, we believe that remembering our history is essential to forming citizens capable of sustaining our constitutional order and pursuing the common good.”

Kavanaugh has served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States since 2018, following his nomination by President Donald J. Trump. On Sept. 11, 2001, he was associate counsel in the White House of former President George W. Bush.

Father Malloy is a professor of theory and Christian ethics. On Sept. 11, 2001, he was president of the University of Notre Dame.

Lichter, a 2004 Notre Dame graduate, is senior advisor to and former president of the March for Life Education and Defense Fund. On Sept. 11, 2001, she was a sophomore at Notre Dame. She has served in senior legal, policy and public-sector roles, including as deputy assistant to the president and deputy director of the White House Domestic Policy Council during the first Trump administration.

Dunne is vice chairman and senior managing principal of Piper Sandler and a longtime leader in the financial services industry. A 1978 Notre Dame graduate, he served as the University’s 2021 Commencement speaker and received an honorary doctor of laws degree from Notre Dame.

The Jeanie Poole O’Shaughnessy Memorial Lecture was established in 2022 following the death of Jeanie Poole O’Shaughnessy, a beloved friend and supporter of the Center. It is and was made possible through the generosity of her husband, J. Patrick O’Shaughnessy, Jeanie’s friends, and the O’Shaughnessy family. The event aims to help Notre Dame students and the Notre Dame community connect scholarship and education concerning the ideas and institutions of constitutional government with the principles put into practice by the individuals shaping the civic fabric of our country.

Previous Jeanie Poole O’Shaughnessy Memorial Lecture speakers have included U.S. Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina, former U.S. Secretary of State Michael Pompeo, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett. The lecture reflects the Center’s broader commitment to introducing Notre Dame students to prominent public figures and providing opportunities to consider the principles, virtues, and responsibilities that accompany civic leadership.

The Center for Citizenship and Constitutional Government seeks to cultivate thoughtful and educated citizens by supporting scholarship and education concerning the ideas and institutions of constitutional government. Through lectures, seminars, fellowships, and other programs, the Center seeks to prepare students to participate thoughtfully in civic life and contribute to the public good.

The Sept. 11 event is free but ticketed. The conversation will also be livestreamed through the center’s YouTube channel.

While tickets are no longer available through the Center’s website, a limited number of tickets will be available in a standby line at the DeBartolo Performing Arts Center the day of the event to students, faculty, and staff with a valid Notre Dame ID. If you have questions about how you may obtain a ticket, or for any other matter pertaining to “25 Years After 9/11,” please reach out to CCCG Assistant Director Anna Bradley at abradle4@nd.edu.

Originally published by Anna Bradley at constudies.nd.edu on August 28, 2026.

Operation Midway Blitz was getting underway. Hundreds of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents were being deployed in the Chicago region, apprehending thousands of people.

Adriana Pérez ’22 was working her Sunday breaking news shift.

The Chicago Tribune reporter normally writes about the environment and climate change, but as one of the newspaper’s native Spanish speakers, she was sent to find and interview witnesses of one of the first arrests: a flower vendor who was picked off the street on Sept. 7, 2025, and deported to Mexico a few days later.

For the next two months, more arrests were made, and more stories needed to be told. Pérez paused much of her environment writing to continue interviewing and writing about Spanish-speaking ICE detainees and their families.

And she wasn’t working alone — far from it. The Chicago Tribune’s staff of more than 70 reporters, editors, and photojournalists — plus journalists at other publications throughout the city — dug deep into the stories coming to light in their community, ranging from safety risks of ICE tactics to Dr. Phil’s involvement in the immigration raids.

One of Pérez’s collaborators was Madeline Buckley ’11, who shares with Pérez both a workplace and a status as an alumna of the University of Notre Dame’s Gallivan Program in Journalism, Ethics, and Democracy (JED).

“Everyone feels so connected to Chicago and really wants to do right by Chicago, and I think all of that came through in the reporting.” - Madeline Buckley ’11, Chicago Tribune reporter

As a criminal justice reporter, Buckley covered legal issues around immigration arrests, among other topics. She debunked misinformation about protesters and detainees and, for one article, she and two other journalists investigated the Trump administration’s claims about violence perpetrated by protesters against immigration agents. Along with her colleagues, she analyzed court records and attempted to reach about 100 protesters. The resulting story revealed that many of the administration’s claims were untrue, and numerous cases weren’t holding up in court.

“It was an all-hands-on-deck situation,” Pérez said.

The Pulitzer Prize Board recognized the extraordinary efforts of the entire Chicago Tribune staff and awarded the newsroom the 2026 Pulitzer Prize in the Local Reporting category for their “powerful coverage.” They were also a finalist in the Public Service category.

At 1 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 20, Pérez and Buckley will have a conversation with fellow alumnus, journalist, and Pulitzer-winner Carlos Lozada ’93 in the Sojourner Truth Commons on the third floor of O’Shaughnessy Hall. They’ll discuss the politics of immigration reporting, the state of local news, and the Pulitzer Prize.

“Everyone at the Tribune was so dedicated and committed to telling the story,” Buckley said. “Everyone feels so connected to Chicago and really wants to do right by Chicago, and I think all of that came through in the reporting.”

From curiosity to climate change coverage

Though coming from a family of journalists, Pérez didn’t attend Notre Dame with plans to follow in their footsteps. She initially majored in psychology, and when she heard about the JED program, she applied more out of curiosity than ambition.

But journalism must be genetic — Pérez loved it instantly.

The JED minor felt different from other classes — instead of MLA-formatted essays and reading textbooks, Pérez wrote magazine articles and studied the front page of The New York Times.

“It felt like I was learning about the world as things were happening,” she said.

Pérez quickly realized she wanted to switch her major to political science to better complement her new aspirations. The major helped her learn more about the people and systems she hoped to report on while giving her the flexibility to take classes related to her specific interests.

One writing seminar, The Politics of Borders, still influences the way Pérez approaches immigration. A main focus of the class was the importance of language when talking and writing about immigrants. Pérez learned that using terms like “masses” or “a wave” when describing immigrants can diminish individuality and dehumanize a vulnerable population. The class also discussed the moral implications of journalistic voyeurism — when a reporter infiltrates a community and uses their experiences for a story without contributing anything in return.

“Reporting is not just about grabbing their story and putting it on the page and never hearing from them again,” Pérez said. “You are there, in a way, to tell their story to their benefit.”

Pérez’s desire to help the communities she covers has always been central to her journalism career and has guided her toward environmental reporting.

She began at the Tribune as a breaking news intern, a role she secured through the JED program, and was hired full-time soon after. Within a year, Pérez’s editor asked what she wanted to do in the long term.

“Asking thoughtful questions, being curious — it’s a muscle you work on, and I wouldn’t have the basis for it if it wasn’t for my liberal arts education at Notre Dame.” - Adriana Pérez ’22, Chicago Tribune reporter

Her answer was something that’s easier said than done: fighting climate change.

“It’s the crisis of my generation,” she said. “And I realized I can address this problem from my place, from my talents and my passion.”

Pérez is originally from Ecuador, where many of the climate crisis’s most prominent stories take place: deforestation in the Amazon rainforest, plastic pollution in the Pacific Ocean, and overfishing in the Galapagos Islands. When people talk about climate change, she said, these are the landscapes and the problems that first come to mind.

When it comes to climate coverage, she admits the Midwest doesn’t get as much of the spotlight — not because its ecosystems are less important or less in danger. The Great Lakes, wetlands, and prairies have their own roles and needs, she said, so Chicagoans don’t need to look far to find nature they can protect.

“My job is saying, ‘There are things around you that you should care about,’” Pérez said. “And that’s very meaningful to me.”

She’s now been writing about the environment for three years, covering issues like intensifying heat waves, wildlife conservation, and the potential impacts of data centers. Through her work, Pérez serves the public while satisfying the curiosity that drew her to journalism in the first place.

“Asking thoughtful questions, being curious — it’s a muscle you work on, and I wouldn’t have the basis for it if it wasn’t for my liberal arts education at Notre Dame,” she said.

Think critically to make a better world

Before she was a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Buckley was just a Notre Dame first-year student trying to get involved on campus.

She found her way to The Observer, a student newspaper serving the Notre Dame, Saint Mary’s College, and Holy Cross College campuses. Buckley wrote news stories and designed pages for the print paper while making lifelong friends, learning about her new home, and sparking her interest in journalism.

“It pretty much just immediately sucked me in,” she said.

Applying for the JED minor was the natural next step, and picking her major became a search for the best supplement to a journalism education. Buckley found American studies, which examines many important topics in American life and history. She said it was perfect preparation for a profession that requires knowledge about a little bit of everything.

During her four years, Buckley remained active at The Observer, eventually becoming a news editor and then managing editor.

“That was great training for being a journalist because you learn how to mine every aspect of your life for potential story ideas,” she said.

She gained off-campus experience through three journalism internships — at the South Bend Tribune, the Concord Monitor in New Hampshire, and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in Pennsylvania — with help from JED connections. By the time she got her diploma, Buckley was more than ready to become a full-time reporter.

She started out at the Brownsville Herald in small-town Texas, and then made her way to larger cities with bigger papers — back to the South Bend Tribune, then to The Indianapolis Star.

“I’m still learning new things every day, but those Arts & Letters classes teach you to think critically, which is an essential skill for journalists.” - Madline Buckley ’11, Chicago Tribune reporter

But Buckley grew up in Chicago’s suburbs, so working at the Chicago Tribune was always her dream. When the paper had an opening, she jumped at the opportunity.

“It’s a good feeling to have an impact in the place where you’re from,” she said.

Now Buckley has been with the Tribune for the last nine years, and while there’s definitely some childhood familiarity, her work has introduced her to new parts of the city. As a crime and courts reporter, Buckley digs into Cook County’s criminal justice policies and covers major trials that shape Chicago life.

For Buckley, reporting is more than sharing legal details and statistics, and more than telling individual stories — it’s writing the first draft of history, putting events into context. It requires the ability to analyze, which Buckley credits to her college days.

“I’m still learning new things every day, but those Arts & Letters classes teach you to think critically, which is an essential skill for journalists,” she said. “We have to evaluate our information for accuracy and for fairness and to make sure it merits publishing.”

It’s a significant undertaking, especially in one of the biggest cities in the country, but Buckley said she can’t imagine doing anything else.

“A lot of journalists will say, ‘We’re not doing it for the awards,’ and it’s a cliche, but I do think it’s true,” Buckley said. “Our main mission is to make the city a better place, and that is what will guide us going forward.”

The everchanging social, political, and economic landscape in many countries has become more tenuous and intense in recent years. Respondents in a 2026 report from the World Economic Forum indicated a prevailing mood of uncertainty, with 50% of them anticipating a turbulent or stormy outlook on life over the next two years. This negative perception swells to 57% of respondents when looking ahead to the next 10 years.

Social structures, government policies, and cultural norms shape how people think, live, and interact. If those factors are in constant flux, the repercussions can have adverse effects. More worrisome, however, is how external stressors affect pregnant women, who are already experiencing significant physiological changes in preparation for the birth of a baby and, subsequently, adjusting to life with a newborn.

If there are additional factors in a mother’s own life — such as violent, turbulent, or uncertain social or political circumstances — then her fear and anxiety will likely increase, potentially putting her and her unborn child’s health at risk. The impacts of these sociopolitical stressors could lead to preterm birth, among other complications, not to mention the psychological and physiological effects.

“Yet, we know very little about how mothers cope with these stressors,” said Kristine Joy Chua, assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Notre Dame. Chua researches reproductive biology, maternal health, and health inequities, particularly within Filipino communities and communities of color.

This gap motivated Chua and her fellow researchers to ask the question: How do expectant mothers manage these uncertainties and cope with sociopolitical stressors? The answer became the focus of their recently published study in the journal Social Science and Medicine, of which Chua was the lead author.

Interviewing 21 pregnant Filipina women across multiple regions of the Philippines in 2021, Chua and her team sought to understand how these women internalized such stressors. They found that they used creative coping strategies, some of which are grounded in Filipino cultural practices and shaped how they navigated such uncertainties. Some reframed difficult circumstances and maintained a positive outlook, while others deliberately disengaged from political stressors and focused instead on the well-being of their families.

What causes stress and where does it come from?

According to Chua and her co-authors, previous research had been limited in that it did not address how pregnant individuals perceive and embody outside stressors and the implications for health. Nor did it address the various coping strategies they found useful in dealing with stress in order to protect their bodies and pregnancies.

The research team specifically chose to study pregnant women in the Philippines, a country marked by intense state violence, high poverty rates, political corruption, and a highly publicized war on drugs, as well as some of the world’s strictest COVID pandemic lockdown restrictions during the research period.

Their interviews with the pregnant women revealed how interconnected social, political, and economic stressors can be—with 67 percent of study participants citing financial stress, 38 percent indicating access to quality medical care, and 52 percent saying cultural pressures affected their emotional, physical, and mental well-being.

One of the societal challenges compounding this predicament for citizens of the Philippines is their outsized reliance on social media for gathering news and information—an open portal that has the potential to continuously feed them negative or politicized discourse. According to Chua and her co-authors, 62 percent of their study participants cited Facebook or other social media sites as their primary source of information, adding that the “news they ingested had a profound impact on their perceived stress levels.”

What are some ways new moms cope?

The interviewees revealed that not all of the negative news they consumed necessarily affected them adversely. Many described relying on creative coping strategies pulled from within their Filipino identity and upbringing.

For example, noted the researchers, many expectant mothers found ways to reframe those stressors. One way to accomplish that is through the concept of “community viewing”—comparing oneself to others to determine who might be “doing better.” The realization that others within their circle might actually be relatively worse off (experiencing death, food scarcity, and extreme poverty, for example) allowed them to manage the difficulties of their own situations.

Second, maintaining a positive outlook on life and being able to “laugh things off” gave them a new perspective and renewed state of mind that enabled them to ‘build resiliency against adversity.”

Another reframing technique many expectant moms found useful was looking toward their relationships with family members and appreciating the positive aspects of their lives. Said one study participant: “We cope by remembering the blessings we have [now] and that are yet to come.”

Chua said that participants also found ways to exercise their own agency, which could manifest in one of three cultural practices. One is disengaging and remaining indifferent or resistant to the news of the day—letting the negative news “go in one ear and out the other,” as one participant described.

A second method is to invoke the mentality of bahala na—a phrase that translates to “whatever happens, happens” and is driven by a belief that God will provide. In other words, they believe that regardless of how difficult things are or how far out of their control the situation may become, these new moms and their families will somehow prevail.

Finally, respondents found outright avoidance to be a surefire way to leave some of those stressors behind and move forward with daily living. Deliberately staying silent—as opposed to engaging in political debates or trying to change others’ political opinions—allowed them to protect themselves against unpleasant, negative, and stressful experiences during pregnancy, the co-authors wrote. Rather, they focused “on concerns within their immediate control,” such as the current safety and health of their children and the general well-being of their families.

Chua emphasized that “the intent of the work is not to romanticize what might be viewed as a passive outlook or response, but to investigate the strategies these women have at their disposal to cope and deal with challenging circumstances. Doing so is harmful to the participants and to the field of study.”

“Maternal and fetal health is influenced not only by medical care but also by the broader social and political environment. And politics definitely plays a significant role in shaping perinatal health.”

What can these findings mean for other mothers?

While these specific coping strategies were utilized by the pregnant Filipina women included in Chua’s study, their insights may extend to any expectant mother living with social, political, and financial stressors.

“Maternal and fetal health is influenced not only by medical care but also by the broader social and political environment,” Chua said. “And politics definitely plays a significant role in shaping perinatal health.”

Chua said the research highlighted how further work is needed to fully understand this interaction, as well as how these coping strategies affect stress biology during pregnancy and its impact on newborn health. “Future study also needs to take into account how helpful or harmful these coping strategies may be,” she added.

“Our study is one of the first to examine how Filipina women embody politics during pregnancy,” the co-authors wrote. “We expect these findings to contribute to the advancement of women’s health on a local and global level by demonstrating the complexities associated with stress embodiment, management, and its impact on fetal development.”

Contact: Tracy DeStazio, associate director of media relations, 574-631-9958 or tdestazi@nd.edu

Originally published by Tracy DeStazio at news.nd.edu on September 03, 2026.

It’s a Monday afternoon in August, and Paul Popiel’s team takes the field at an NFL stadium in 20 days.

He doesn’t know who will be on his final roster, nor has he had a moment to assess their abilities. Even once practice starts, he only sees his team for 90 minutes a day.

That’s just life for a marching band director. But he’s confident in the outcome.

“I feel like the band always wins,” he said. “If we support the team, we entertain the crowd, and we represent the University well, it’s a good day. And I'm looking forward to doing that several times this fall.”

“Creating with students is hard to describe, but even harder to live without.”

Popiel — an acclaimed conductor, music scholar and teacher, and higher education administrator — became the Kenn and Pamela Ricci Director of Bands at the University of Notre Dame in July, a role that oversees athletic, concert, and jazz bands and their performances at dozens of athletic, academic, and liturgical events every year.

For right now, and in the days and weeks ahead, Popiel’s focus is on the 181st iteration of the Band of the Fighting Irish. While the season is long (the Shamrock Series season opener at Lambeau Field on Sept. 6, followed by six home games throughout the fall, and a potential College Football Playoff run through January), the preparation period is short. Students arrive to begin tryouts and rehearsals the Wednesday before the fall semester starts, and by the following Sunday, Popiel and his team determine which 350 musicians make the cut.

It’s a number driven by necessity — namely, the logistics and cost of travel to road games — but it’s also a number of significance for each student who comprises it.

“A family bond is built really quickly,” Popiel said. “By Sunday, I would very much hope that every single student feels like they have 350 family members they could reach out to. That sounds pie in the sky, but it's almost a guarantee that they're all going to feel that.”

Heart and soul

Popiel began playing the trumpet in fifth grade, and it didn’t take long for his life to become all about music.

Yet, for as much time as he had devoted as a child and teen to rehearsals, performances, and camps, he at first resisted the pull of becoming a music major as an undergraduate at Truman State University. He was a pre-med and math student while playing in the marching, concert, and jazz bands — but eventually, the choice for his academic future became clear.

“Music was the heart and soul of every day for me,” he said. “When I came to the realization that I had to be doing music to be happy, the rest came pretty easily.”

After graduating, Popiel came to Notre Dame in 1993 for a master’s degree in trumpet performance and to work as a teaching assistant with the Band of the Fighting Irish.

There were many more stops along the way for Popiel after that — a doctorate in musical arts in wind conducting from Michigan State University and faculty positions at Indiana University, Oklahoma State University, and the University of Kansas.

But those two years at Notre Dame were formative, in ways he didn’t fully appreciate until he considered coming back.

“That program really set the tone for my music teaching career — this place had formed me, taught me values,” he said. “I just didn’t realize what was happening, or I had forgotten. The commitment to students here is just so appealing. And everyone wants the same thing — to make the world a better place through whatever it is they’re doing at Notre Dame.”

When the search for the next director of bands at Notre Dame began, Popiel was in his third year as dean of the KU School of Music, where he had been a faculty member since 2010. He felt called to consider the role, while at the same time coming up with all sorts of reasons to resist it.

Even when he arrived on campus for his final interview, he was apprehensive — but every conversation made him more and more certain that Notre Dame was where he needed to be. The singular focus on student formation resonated with him — and while he valued the experience of leading a school, he yearned to be in a position where he could engage with students on a daily basis again.

“Our research is every day in the classroom, creating and performing together,” he said. “That’s a unique situation in the academy — maybe the closest thing is athletics, where you have a coach working with players every day on the field. Creating with students is hard to describe, but even harder to live without.”

Trite but true

Popiel is very much aware that he has big shoes to fill — and a big legacy to uphold. He finds the challenge more encouraging than daunting.

A joint appointment in the College of Arts & Letters’ Department of Music and the Division of Student Affairs, the Kenn and Pamela Ricci Director of Bands is a position that involves leadership, teaching, and attention to the student experience. Popiel succeeds Kenneth Dye, who held the position for 28 years, and he is just the sixth full-time director in the band’s 181-year history.

The band was already in its 41st year when the first Notre Dame football game was played, and music and football have been entwined ever since. For Popiel, that compels him to act as the steward of an institution, not someone seeking to redefine it.

“You're not driving it where you want it to go; you're driving it where its legacy needs it to go,” he said. “That history is a remarkable thing. To be the custodian of that, to care and nurture the organization, then pass it on to the next generation — all of those things that sound a little bit trite are all true.”

If nothing else, Popiel hopes his time at the helm will offer even more opportunity for students to encounter that musical legacy. All told, more than 500 undergraduate and graduate students from Notre Dame, Saint Mary’s College, and Holy Cross College will participate in a band this year.

For Popiel, though, that’s not enough — the benefits of participation are simply too great.

“I jokingly say I'll quit recruiting when every single student at Notre Dame is playing in a band,” he said. “Making music together builds friendships quickly. It's good for student retention. It's good for their GPA. People who play music together are happier and healthier and more socially connected.”

Playing music, Popiel says, goes beyond connecting with an audience — it’s a powerful means of connecting with each other and building community in a way that can’t be done through mere conversation.

“Notre Dame challenges its students to transform their passions into meaningful contributions to the world, and that vision has been a defining influence throughout my career.”

It’s what happens when his musicians play the Victory March for the first time at Notre Dame Stadium. It’s what happens when they’re in a rehearsal hall preparing for the winter University Band concert. It’s what happens when an ensemble plays at Mass in the Basilica of the Sacred Heart.

Whether the music is heard by 80,000 or eight people, the act of students creating it together has changed them — and Popiel believes he’s now where the most change can be made.

“Notre Dame challenges its students to transform their passions into meaningful contributions to the world, and that vision has been a defining influence throughout my career,” he said. “To be back in this place and to help guide that toward inspiring yet another generation of people that want to make the world better through music has been a really strong call for me.”

The Ricci Family

The Kenn and Pamela Ricci Director of Bands position is supported through a generous gift from Kenn Ricci, an aviation industry leader who is a Notre Dame alumnus and Trustee, and his wife, Pamela.

Kenn is a 1978 graduate of Notre Dame with a bachelor’s degree in accountancy and the founder and principal of Directional Aviation and chairman of Flexjet. He began his aviation career as an Air Force ROTC cadet at Notre Dame and was a member of the Band of the Fighting Irish as an undergraduate. He later earned a juris doctorate from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law, now Cleveland State University College of Law.

Ricci serves on the University of Notre Dame Board of Trustees and has been actively involved with Notre Dame for decades, previously serving on the Undergraduate Experience Advisory Council and the Mendoza College of Business Advisory Council.

The Riccis have been longtime benefactors of Notre Dame. Their philanthropy has supported the Band of the Fighting Irish, Ricci Family Fields, Ricci Band Rehearsal Hall, the Ricci Band Musical Excellence Fund, and several scholarship funds. In 2017, the Riccis announced a first-of-its-kind $100 million unrestricted commitment to Notre Dame through a Philanthropic Succession Partnership.

They have three children, Elizabeth, Kennedy, and Austin.

Department chair and professor Anne García-Romero, won the Edited Works Award for her work on María Irene Fornés in Context, co-edited with Brian Eugenio Herrera. The award recognizes multi-authored edited projects in the fields of theatre and performance that demonstrate complex and critical engagement with dramatic texts, performances, histories, theories, practices, and/or pedagogies.

Patrick McKelvey,  associate professor, won the Outstanding Article Award for his Theatre Journal article "'Honest Work Done by Honest Dogs': Canine Unemployment, Interspecies Rehabilitation, and Disability Performance." This award acknowledges scholarship marked by methodological sophistication, complex and critical engagement with dramatic texts and performances, focused inquiries, and possible directions for future scholarship.

Associate professor Tarryn Chun presented the Asian Theatre Journal (ATJ) Lecture on her book Revolutionary Stagecraft: New Methods for the Study of Modern Chinese Theatre. The lecture is a part of a long-standing tradition that invites a leading scholar to reflect on the development of the field, introduce new research methods, and offer perspectives on future directions in Asian theatre and performance studies. Chun was also the coordinator for a session on "Internationalizing ATHE," which highlighted challenges in the field and asked, "How can we more effectively engage scholars from across the globe to advance the study and visibility of non-Western theater?"

 Sarah Gitenstein, assistant professor, presented 'The Body Onstage: Best Practices in Directing' for the Directing Debut Panel, a session for emerging scholars and directors presenting at ATHE for the first time, highlighting new research, practice, and pedagogy in theatre directing. She also joined a roundtable on Casting Queer Theatre, which brought academics and professionals together to discuss how the industry is changing in terms of casting. In conjunction with ATHE, Gitenstein also presented at the Association for Theatre Movement Educators pre-conference on "What the Body Carries: Sustainable Practice for Theatre Artists" with her collaborator Avi Wolf, exploring how centering the mind-body relationship in rehearsal can reduce harm.

An advocate for the field of theatre and performance in higher education, ATHE serves as an intellectual and artistic center for producing new knowledge about theatre and performance-related disciplines, cultivating vital alliances with other scholarly and creative disciplines, linking with professional and community-based theatres, and promoting access and equity.

Originally published by Todd Boruff at ftt.nd.edu on August 26, 2026.

Mayte plans to attend law school after graduating in May, and the Miami, Florida, native wants to take her future law degree outside the U.S. She says she’s interested in constitutional and international law, as well as European politics and diplomacy. Notre Dame’s Diplomacy Scholars Program and the Nanovic Institute provided her with the opportunity to explore her interests outside the classroom.

“One of the most meaningful experiences was traveling to The Hague and visiting institutions like the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court. Being able to see these institutions in person and learn about the work being done there was truly a dream come true and made me even more excited about pursuing a career at the intersection of law, government, and international affairs.”

Mayte also highlights her previous leadership role in Beyond the Dome’s Law, Government, and Public Policy Career Community, her top pick among BTD resources. Her responsibilities as a director included organizing events tailored for students studying law, government, and public policy, sometimes bringing in guest speakers such as former senior CIA official Amy McAuliffe and others who could speak to their experiences in the LGPP field.

“One of my favorite moments was bringing in Judge Andrea R. Wolfson, a Notre Dame alumna who serves in the Criminal Division at the Richard E. Gerstein Justice Building in Miami. I had previously interned for Judge Wolfson [...] It was incredibly meaningful to bring someone who had once been a Notre Dame student herself into the BTD community and connect her experiences with students who are now exploring similar paths.”

As she takes on the role of CEO of the Beyond the Dome student board, Mayte wants to strengthen student involvement, particularly in BTD’s Peers2Careers program, which supports Arts and Letters students through peer mentoring and dorm outreach initiatives. But her goals aren’t just basic engagement. Mayte says she wants to empower students to become BTD leaders, a role she has years of experience in.

“One of the things I’m most proud of about my BTD experience is that I’ve had the opportunity to grow through four different leadership roles. I started as the BFM Peer Mentoring Lead, then became the Law, Government & Public Policy Career Community Lead, served as the Director of Law, Government & Public Policy last year, and now have the honor of serving as CEO. Each role has taught me something different and helped me grow as a leader, and I want other students to see that their first role in BTD can be the beginning of something much bigger. Ultimately, I want students to feel like they have a place in BTD, find people who believe in them, and feel empowered to step into leadership themselves.”

With a long history of leadership, we figured Mayte would also be able to lead us in the right direction for some other things, like her favorite spot to lock in around campus and where to get the best bite to eat.

What's your go-to study spot on campus?

I love reserving a study room in Hesburgh Library, especially the rooms with whiteboards. It’s my go-to spot when I need to really lock in, map out my semester, or turn a million thoughts into an actual plan. I love being able to spread everything out, write on the whiteboard, and just focus. There’s something about a quiet library room that makes me feel like I can get anything done!

What's your favorite place to go in South Bend?

Jinya Ramen is definitely one of my favorite spots, especially for their spicy tuna tacos! I also love exploring different restaurants and coffee shops around South Bend with friends. One of my favorite parts of being at Notre Dame has been discovering little places around Michiana and making memories with friends outside of campus.

What's the top song on your playlist right now?

“Dive” by Olivia Dean. It’s such a beautiful, feel-good song, and I’ve been listening to Olivia Dean a lot lately! Fun fact: I sang for most of my life, so I have a pretty wide variety of artists and genres that I love listening to. Music has always been a big part of my life, so my playlists are usually all over the place!

What's your current obsession?

Planning, organizing, and making way-too-many lists! Whether it’s planning BTD events, mapping out my semester, or organizing my calendar, I genuinely love having everything planned out. Right now, I’m especially obsessed with getting BTD ready for the year and thinking about all the ways we can make this year meaningful for our students. I’m a big believer that the little details can make a big difference, so I’m always thinking about how we can make people feel welcomed, connected, and excited to be part of BTD.

You can connect with Mayte on LinkedIn or grab a coffee and book a chat with her 

Housed in the Reilly Center for Science, Technology, and Values, the STS minor is open to all undergraduate students — including those majoring in engineering, the sciences, and business — to study how science and technology are shaped by, and in turn reshape, politics, law, and public life. From artificial intelligence regulation and data privacy to climate governance, public health, and biotechnology oversight, the minor explores questions of power, accountability, and the public good.

Current STV students will automatically transition into the STS designation — no new requirements have been added to the program, and the curriculum will continue to require one core course and offer a broad selection of electives.

In addition to the new name, the program has expanded its course selection to emphasize the governance of science and technology, the role of science and technology in regulatory and development projects, and public engagement and democratic accountability.

For STEM students, this offers a crucial complement to technical training by highlighting how political and legal frameworks determine what research gets supported, how innovations are implemented, and how risks are managed. For students studying the humanities, social sciences, and business, the minor provides substantive literacy in the sciences and technologies driving today’s most urgent policy debates.

“In a world where decisions about algorithms, climate models, vaccines, and infrastructure are as political as they are technical, our students need to understand not only how technologies work, but how they are governed,” said Anna Geltzer, associate teaching professor in the Reilly Center and director of the STS program. “The STS minor prepares students to be leaders who can navigate and shape those debates in government, industry, law, non-profit organizations, and more.”

Students can learn more at reilly.nd.edu or contact Anna Geltzer.

On Tuesday, Aug. 18, Pope Leo XIV appointed two University of Notre Dame faculty members, Emmanuel Katongole and Clemens Sedmak, as consultors to the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development. University Trustee Kathryn “Katie” Koch, president and CEO of TCW, a global investment management firm, was also named a consultor.

Katongole, a professor of theology and peace studies and director of the Ansari Institute for Global Engagement with Religion; Sedmak, a professor of social ethics and director of the Nanovic Institute for European Studies; and Koch are among 12 new consultors from around the globe — and the only three selected from within the United States. They have been appointed for a five-year term.

Consultors may be religious or laypeople and are chosen “from among the faithful who are distinguished by their expertise, proven ability, and prudence,” according to the Vatican’s announcement.

“These appointments are a tremendous honor not only for Emmanuel, Clemens, and Katie, but for the University as a whole,” said Notre Dame President Rev. Robert A. Dowd, C.S.C. “We congratulate them on their selection, and we are deeply grateful for the Holy Father’s recognition of their expertise and abiding commitment to the Church. We look forward to the ways their leadership and wisdom will guide the important work of the dicastery.”

Established by the late Pope Francis in 2016, the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development supports the Church’s worldwide efforts in the areas of human dignity and human rights, economic justice, care for creation, migration, and displacement, as well as peace, conflict, and humanitarian crises.

Katongole, who came to Notre Dame in 2013, holds a joint appointment in the University’s College of Arts and Letters and Keough School of Global Affairs. A native of Kampala, Uganda, and a priest of the Kampala Archdiocese, he is the founder and president of Bethany Land Institute, a residential agricultural institute that works with young people to realize the vision, spirituality, and practice of Laudato si’ in Uganda. Before joining the Notre Dame faculty, he served as an associate professor of theology and world Christianity at Duke University and was a founding co-director of the Duke Center for Reconciliation. He earned a Bachelor of Divinity at the Pontifical University Urbaniana in Rome, as well as a master’s in religious studies and a doctoral degree in philosophy from the Catholic University of Louvain in Belgium.

Sedmak, a concurrent professor of theology, holds a joint appointment in Notre Dame’s Institute for Social Concerns and the Keough School. His research focuses on issues of poverty, justice, and the Catholic social tradition, as well as a collaboration with Notre Dame colleagues on the Church’s role in acclimating refugees into Italian society. A native Austrian, Sedmak holds a doctoral degree in theology from the Catholic Private University of Linz and doctoral degrees in philosophy and social theory from the University of Innsbruck. Prior to joining Notre Dame, Sedmak served as the F.D. Maurice Professor for Moral Theology and Social Theology at King’s College London. He also held multiple positions at the University of Salzburg and was president of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Social Ethics in Salzburg.

Koch, a Notre Dame alumna, was named a University Trustee in 2023. Prior to moving to TCW, she spent 20 years at Goldman Sachs in a variety of leadership positions, including chief investment officer of public equity. She graduated from Notre Dame in 2002 with a Bachelor of Arts in economics and English.

Originally published by Carrie Gates at news.nd.edu on August 20, 2026.

Kyle Lauckner never wanted to stop being a Boy Scout. That’s why he’s working toward a career in the federal government focused on poverty alleviation.

For Lauckner, a Notre Dame junior majoring in economics and political science, both pursuits are all about service. And a new program is helping him understand how being an economist can help him continue to live out his Scout Oath “to help other people at all times.”

The evidence-based poverty alleviation concentration (EBPAC), a collaboration between the Department of Economics and the University of Notre Dame Poverty Initiative, is designed to train students in poverty research and guide them into careers addressing poverty.

“Ultimately, we’re doing this work because everybody has innate value and dignity.” - Adrienne Judson, assistant teaching professor of economics

“Scouting America cultivated my passion for civic service and being involved in my community,” said Lauckner, who’s part of EBPAC’s first cohort. “EBPAC prepares me for a job where I’m able to implement policy that really helps people’s lives.”

The concentration is one way students can get involved in the Poverty Initiative’s Poverty Research Fellows (PRF) Program, a community of students who are passionate about understanding and addressing poverty. While EBPAC is only for economics and international economics majors, PRF is available to all undergraduates.

“If we really want to make a dent on poverty in the world, we don’t just need to be doing research now,” said Adrienne Judson, assistant teaching professor of economics and director of the concentration. “We need to be equipping the next generation of people who are going to rise up and do this work in the future.”

Poverty isn’t a new problem — for hundreds of years, people have been designing programs meant to alleviate poverty, often relying on anecdotal or theoretical evidence, Judson said. But it hasn’t been until recent decades that economists and policymakers have had the statistical techniques available to conduct solid analysis of their effectiveness.

That’s why EBPAC and the Poverty Initiative as a whole are focused on building up high-quality evidence about poverty alleviation, helping governments and organizations channel resources toward programs that are actually effective.

“We don’t want to spend time talking in circles about theoretical possibilities when we have the ability to actually gather evidence and see if these programs are really helping,” Judson said.

Centering career discernment

EBPAC students take the same core classes as all economics majors, then add two required classes that form the foundation of the concentration. The first is Economics of Poverty, which defines poverty from an economic perspective and gives an overview of poverty across human history — where it happens, what policies have and haven’t been successful, and how poverty has changed.

The Economics of Poverty course is open to all students, and Lauckner took it last semester. He said he enjoyed its frequent hands-on assignments — like calculating multidimensional poverty indices and preparing policy briefs — but the key takeaway was that there’s always more to learn.

“I left thinking forward,” he said. ”I know the landscape right now, and I can go out and do something with it.”

The second core EBPAC class, Causal Inference for Poverty Alleviation, will be offered for the first time this semester. It’s an advanced statistical methods course that gives students a deeper idea of the research methods economists use to study antipoverty policies.

In addition to these two required classes, students take three poverty-related economics electives and complete three experiential learning courses. Two of those must come from enriching experience seminars, which bring in external speakers who work in various areas of poverty alleviation work. Students speak with these professionals to get a sense of what career they might want to pursue.

Students interested in fighting poverty often pursue graduate-level education within economics, law, public policy, and international affairs. Others also enter careers in nonprofit leadership, research administration, research communication, and other fields.

“Those types of jobs are not going to necessarily show up in a Google search,” Judson said. “But they do exist, and they offer a pathway into the type of meaningful work that a lot of our students are looking for.”

For their third experiential learning course, students can either take a third seminar session or sign up for one of the concentration’s immersive trips to Washington, D.C., or another location where Notre Dame’s research partners are investigating poverty. Last semester, students met with people who work on poverty-related policy on Capitol Hill, in the Supreme Court, at the Federal Reserve, and in think tanks.

Daniella Morales-Garibay is one of the students who went to D.C., and the trip made her start aiming for law school and a career in policy.

“My first year, I wasn’t quite sure how I could work in the policy area with an econ major, but being in the concentration has allowed me to understand exactly how I can do it and learn from people who have done it,” she said. “That’s been incredibly important in my journey discerning what I want to do and the topics I want to explore.”

Part of a campus-wide effort

This summer, both Morales-Garibay and Lauckner gained additional experience in poverty alleviation through PRF internships and were placed at the Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities, where they helped assess the lab’s state and national poverty programs. The internship isn’t required for the concentration, but it’s another way students from any major can get involved in the Poverty Research Fellows Program.

There are many students who are interested in poverty alleviation but can’t join the concentration because they are not economics majors or don’t have the schedule space, Judson said. However, they can still get involved by enrolling in the Economics of Poverty course, working through internships, or participating in the Poverty Research Community.

Each semester, students in this community attend three campus events related to poverty research. Several organizations — in addition to the Poverty Initiative — host these events, creating a far-reaching, interdisciplinary set of offerings that reflects the breadth of poverty research at Notre Dame. Additionally, similar poverty research concentrations will launch in additional majors, starting with other social science disciplines.

“We're really excited about that because it expands our ability to reach students from multiple disciplines who are interested in these issues,” Judson said.

At all levels of involvement, poverty research at Notre Dame is about centering human dignity, and Judson is making it a top priority in her EBPAC classes. Researching the causes, effects, and potential remedies of poverty requires students to think from diverse perspectives.

“No matter where our students end up down the road, we want them to have a sense of compassion and respect for people who are in challenging life situations,” Judson said. “Ultimately, we’re doing this work because everybody has innate value and dignity.”

When Lipe Fernandes considered his education after high school, he wanted something more than career prep.

He wanted the whole college experience — something that would develop him as a person, not just his resume.

“Education shouldn’t be only a utilitarian thing,” he said. “In college, you have the opportunity to explore more than just what you think you’ll be doing in the future.”

Fernandes’ appetite for something more drove him to leave his home country of Brazil to study in the U.S., and it’s why he’s glad he picked the University of Notre Dame.

“I found something where I can cultivate both an intellectual life and a practical life,” he said.

As an incoming student, he initially majored in economics and philosophy to better understand the forces shaping current social issues. But as he learned more about what he wanted from his undergraduate education, he swapped economics for political science — a field more qualitative and flexible. But there was still something missing.

“At Notre Dame, we have to take philosophy classes, theology classes, literature, languages,” he said. “And I realized I wanted something that didn’t treat them separately, but tried to unify them.”

In his second semester, Fernandes took a University Seminar class — Catholicism & the Disciplines: The Catholic Intellectual Life — with Thomas Stapleford, an associate professor in the Program of Liberal Studies. Stapleford saw how much Fernandes enjoyed the class’ interdisciplinary approach and encouraged him to consider PLS.

Interdisciplinary by nature, the PLS major gives students exposure to the arts, history, literature, natural science, philosophy, politics, and theology through six “great books” seminars. Students also take tutorials that delve into specific disciplines of the liberal arts.

It was just what Fernandes was looking for.

“PLS isn’t just the academic part of philosophy — it’s giving me the tools to think about anything in a philosophical way,” he said.

Now majoring in PLS and political science, Fernandes spends his days exploring justice and equality through Dante’s Divine Comedy or freedom and humanity through St. Augustine’s Confessions. In conversations with his classmates, he encounters a broad range of perspectives on topics from current events to what it means to be human.

Through PLS, Fernandes has also reframed his political science classes, saying it simply brings similar ideas into the present by thinking about philosophy, history, psychology, and other liberal arts in the context of American politics and international relations.

In spring 2026, the now-senior further pursued his love of philosophy and PLS while studying abroad in Rome. He completed a philosophy and theology program at the Thomistic Institute, an organization that strengthens the Catholic intellectual tradition rooted in the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas. He also took classes on metaphysics and the history of intellectual culture, as well as Italian and medieval art.

During his time in Rome, he was happy to learn that his dorm was only a few blocks from Notre Dame Rome, with the Colosseum and the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran also nearby. It was a piece of home away from home, he said, as his love for Notre Dame’s campus and community grew alongside his intellectual formation over the last three years.

“Notre Dame has this notion of a university as a little world where you live,” he said. “It’s not just the place you go to school.”

Back in Indiana, Fernandes loves participating in quintessential student experiences — attending football games, joining campus snowball fights, walking around the lakes, and Grotto visits with fellow residents of Keough Hall (followed by either milkshakes or root beer floats in the dorm kitchen). He’s grown in his faith by studying theology, by talking with Keough’s priest-in-residence, and by sharing his beliefs with his friends. Every day, he’s trying new things and meeting new people, his character and his intellect developing in tandem.

That’s what college should be, Fernandes said, and it’s why he’s taking the extra step to make PLS more accessible for others.

This summer, Fernandes brought a bit of what he learned back to São Paulo, where a local priest has started a classical school for young kids. He has helped run the school and create curriculum that taps into his experiences as a student in the College of Arts & Letters.

“If you study things that are good for you as a human person, you can not only become better and happier for yourself, but you can also learn to become a citizen,” Fernandes said. “You know how to perform your duties and be good to each other as brothers and sisters — in your house, your city, your church, your country.”

This summer, four doctoral students affiliated with the Center for Citizenship & Constitutional Government studied language, culture, and political thought abroad in France. First-year constitutional studies students Luke Thompson, Kody Richards, and Zachary Coddington, as well as political science student Matthew Arildsen, all received grants from the CCCG to make their summer programs possible.

Thompson, Arildsen, and Richards attended Academia Tocqueville, a 12-day intensive seminar in Paris examining the French political tradition. Founded in 2023 with the help of Luke Foster, an assistant professor of government at Hillsdale College and former CCCG postdoctoral fellow, Academia Tocqueville teaches students “to understand the answers French thinkers have offered to the most difficult questions of the modern era.” Outside the classroom, students explored Paris and experienced French culture through art, local cuisine, and even wine tasting.

For Thompson, Academia Tocqueville naturally filled a gap in his previous studies in political theory. In the United States, political theory traditionally concentrates on American and English thinkers. Thompson, however, was drawn in by Foster’s vision of an “immersive educational experience that seeks to remedy the unfortunate neglect of parts of the French intellectual tradition in American colleges.”

By the end of the program, Thompson’s expectations were exceeded.

“The two weeks we spent intensively surveying some of the highlights of French political thought since the Revolution were some of the most formative intellectual experiences of my life,” he said. “And will surely serve as the basis for future study and conversations back here at Notre Dame.”

Studying the French political tradition offered Richards, whose research focuses on American constitutionalism, a deeper understanding of the overlap between our own tradition and the French.

"One of the most impactful practices was studying French works that have been adopted into the American tradition of political thought, such as Montesquieu and Tocqueville, from the French perspective,” she said. “I walked away from the program with a better grasp, not only of French political thought but also with new questions about how we think about French works in the American tradition."

Though Arildsen came into the program with a basic understanding of the French political tradition, he said “Academia Tocqueville rapidly deepened and expanded that understanding.”

During his trip, Arildsen recalled learning a new, uniquely French way of thinking.

“The lectures were riveting, in part because they were a fresh — and distinctively French— perspective on familiar political themes, like immigration, religion, class, and republicanism," he said. "The peers in the cohort were also engaging, intellectually curious, and from a wide variety of backgrounds. I look forward to crossing paths with them in the future.”

Coddington, who had previously attended Academia Tocqueville in 2024, participated in an intensive French language course through the Institut de Touraine. Founded in 1912, the Institut offers immersive language programs teaching what Coddington described as “the king’s French.” Given his dissertation research comparing constitutional theory between the United States and France, studying the language was a natural choice.

Beyond mastering the language, Coddington reflected on his experience with the local culture.

“I have met many friends through the local parish here who have been very kind and helpful as I practice my French," he said. "I have also had the opportunity to explore many of the local historical sites and chateaux, as the region is known for some of the best wine in France.”

Originally published by Kevin Bizily at constudies.nd.edu on July 30, 2026.

Essaka Joshua’s research has taken her from The New York Public Library to archives in Scotland, tracing the intersections of Romantic theatre and disability studies.

Her next stop is a little closer to home.

A professor of English at the University of Notre Dame, Joshua was recently named a 2026-27 long-term fellow at the Newberry Library. In January, she will begin six months of research at the Chicago cultural institution, as the Richard H. Brown/William Lloyd Barber and Mellon Foundation Fellow, and immerse herself in the library’s research community and wide range of historical materials.

“I’m excited to join this vibrant community of scholars working with the Newberry’s extensive European and American collections, and to have an extended period of research time to focus on this project,” she said.

Over the past two decades, Joshua has focused her scholarship on disability studies, especially in her 2020 book Physical Disability in British Romantic Literature. She wrote a chapter for that book about theatre and disability, but removed it to keep the focus on literature. She also wrote about disability in her most recent book, Disability and the Gothic: The Nineteenth Century (Cambridge University Press, 2026). She’s now further exploring the topic, and during her fellowship, she will draw from the Newberry’s rare books from the 18th and 19th centuries, as well as the library’s collection of circus ephemera — posters, handbills, postcards, and more — for her research.

Studying these artifacts from the circuses of 200 years ago will help answer her central research question: Where do we find disability in Romantic-era theatre?

“Circuses then were extravaganzas — they’ve got horses, they’ve got acrobats, they’ve got all sorts of interesting tricks they use to get people through the door,” Joshua said. “What I’m finding is that disabled actors are moving between circus spaces and theatrical spaces, and that happens particularly for actors with dwarfism.”

‘Calling the shots’

Harvey Leach, a central figure in Joshua’s research, didn’t have dwarfism but was born with short, deformed legs that categorized him as a “dwarf actor.” His unique appearance, as well as his acrobatic and acting skills, led to a nearly 40-year theatre and circus career that spanned across Europe and the United States — an enormous and rare achievement for any actor in the Romantic era. Joshua discovered that Leach, who performed under the stage name Hervio Nano, was at the heart of the theatrical life of the period and very much in control of his career — he commissioned his own material, arranged his own tours, and found jobs for other disabled actors.

“Leach was probably one of the most famous American actors of his time, and no one has ever heard of him now,” Joshua said. “He’s a big discovery, and he needs to come out of the shadows.”

Joshua is also shining a spotlight on the life of another American performer, Joseph Stevens, who worked across theatres and museums, becoming a human exhibit for his dwarfism and an actor and docent for his talent and charm. He was a key star in advertisements for museums in New York City, Baltimore, and Philadelphia, and became famous after performing in an adaptation of Henry Fielding’s play Tom Thumb. His career spanned 25 years and laid the groundwork for P. T. Barnum’s more famous protégé, Charles Stratton.

Joshua also recently discovered the identity of a young man known as the ‘Drury Lane dwarf singer.’ Through her research, she found a resignation letter announcing his departure from the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, and offering his services to the rival royal theatre at Covent Garden in London for a higher wage.

“These three actors are really indicative of the possibilities for some disabled people during that period,” Joshua said. “It was possible for disabled people in the Romantic era to not just be exploited exhibits in freak shows but to actually be meaningfully at the center of drama and calling the shots.”

Understanding disability

The stories of dwarf actors and their roles make up just one chapter in Joshua’s upcoming book, tentatively titled “Disability and Romantic Theatre 1780-1840.” The book shows many other ways disability shows up in theatre, from performance subject matter to audience member experiences.

“I’m trying to establish where disability becomes historically important, not just in a literary way or a theatrical way, but in a real-world way, too.”

In one chapter, Joshua highlights a particular 1801 play in which a deaf orphan finds his family and reclaims his noble title after learning sign language. It was performed at a time when sign language was not widespread, and often, deaf people and their families learned it was an option only after watching the play, Joshua said.

“Theatre is often thought of as this entertainment thing on the side,” she said. “But this play ended up being an advocacy tool, and it showed people why sign language matters.”

The book also examines stage madness — through the visual, costuming, and behavioral aspects of theatre. It additionally provides a history of accommodations in Romantic-era theatre, exploring questions like, “What happened if an actor went deaf in the middle of their career? How could a mobility-impaired audience member get to their seat? How did disabled actors break into the theatre world?”

“The heart of the book is the idea of keeping centered on the real world as well as the theatrical world,” Joshua said. “I’m trying to establish where disability becomes historically important, not just in a literary way or a theatrical way, but in a real-world way, too.”

Privilege and dignity

Joshua first became interested in disability studies 30 years ago, when the field's theoretical groundwork was being laid. Alongside the well-established critical, feminist, and Marxist approaches to literary analysis, Joshua taught using a disability-centered framework at the University of Birmingham. She found students were eager to use the new tool, which gave both pupil and teacher a unique worldview.

“I was confronting able-bodied privileges for the first time,” Joshua said. “What am I assuming about able-bodiedness and able-mindedness as I move through the world — and also move through literature?”

When readers abandon their assumptions before analyzing texts, they can uncover new possibilities for characters, stories, and meaning, Joshua said. A key element of disability studies is understanding that disability is not intrinsically bad, but instead a facet of humankind’s diversity. Therefore, it’s important to treat people with disabilities with dignity and study their stories with care, Joshua said.

“We should always reflect the variety of human experience in the study of culture more broadly,” she said. “It’s part of what’s interesting about the world.”

Elizabeth Shewark’s lab looks more like a daycare than a research facility — but that’s kind of the point.

The Childhood and Adolescence Resilience (CARE) Lab in Corbett Family Hall is where Shewark and her team observe families and children at play, hoping to learn how different factors impact children’s social, emotional, and academic development over time.

“Their lives are happening outside of this lab,” Shewark said. “But we’re bringing them in to get snapshots of their lives so we can better understand how to promote healthy development.”

This feature is part of a College of Arts & Letters story series called “Office Hours,” which provides a glimpse into the personal and professional lives of Arts & Letters faculty through their workspaces around campus. This installment highlights Shewark, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology and the William J. Shaw Center for Children and Families Collegiate Chair.

In this interview, Shewark discusses her lab and the tools and personal touches that make her research possible. Her answers have been edited for clarity and conciseness.

Q: Why does your lab have a room full of toys?

A: It’s part of the research. We bring families and children into the lab, and we do some observational tasks with them.

We have activities called “free play,” during which the only instructions children get are, “play as if you were at home.” This is really great because it can give us a lot of information about parent-child and sibling dynamics. When there are no restrictions, we get to see a bit more closely how they interact at home. We realize we’re not going to get totally there because we’re not at home, but by letting them free play, we’re able to get at the family dynamic.

We have fun things for them to play with, like Paw Patrol toys and a Bop It. This grocery store is really popular; they can put on an apron, and it comes with a little fake credit card. We also have a kitchen so they can play-make different meals. And we have blocks for them to play with and bean bags for them to hang out on if they’re chatting. This space is really designed to be very warm, welcoming, fun, and colorful, to make them feel more comfortable.

After free play, we conduct directed parent-child interactions. For example, a little Etch A Sketch task during which the parent and child each get control of one dial on the Etch A Sketch, and then they have to draw something like a house. We observe how the parent guides the child through complex tasks.

Broadly, the CARE Lab is interested in looking at children’s resilience and competency development. We focus on resilience to neighborhood-level stressors, such as poverty and exposure to community violence. For competency, it’s more, “are we seeing social and emotional competency? Are they able to regulate and express themselves and their emotions? Are they able to interact and play in effective ways?” We hope to follow up with them in adolescence to see the transition into a key developmental period.

Q: Where else is your research happening?

A: All of the video and sound from cameras and microphones in the observation room are put in the control room. We watch and listen on the computers, and then we record families’ interactions and play behaviors. We examine if praise was used, if there were positive or negative emotions, whether people got upset because they weren’t sharing, or if frustration was present — things like that all get coded on the back end.

In our undergraduate space, our students do a lot of computer work, like collecting data from public repositories. They’re pulling information about neighborhoods and different environments from public data repositories, such as the EPA, the Census, and the Bureau of Transportation.

The wonderful pieces of artwork in the undergrad space are actually from practice sessions. The training to do a lot of the visit work is pretty in-depth, so we need people for students to practice on, which is normally other students. During one of the tasks, they have to draw a house. The undergrads kept all of their artwork from their practice sessions with their fellow students, and they put them in here. I feel like we have a lot of pretty good talent in here.

Our undergrads also do virtual neighborhood audits via Google Street View, where they code for disorder and maintenance by walking virtually through the neighborhood. We’re really interested in looking at the lived experiences of youth, so not only just with families and with parents, but also within their broader neighborhood context. Families don’t exist in isolation; they’re part of these bigger communities. So we look at access to green and blue space because we know how important that is for the mental health of residents. We also look at maintenance of their neighborhoods, examining if its well-maintained and if there are a lot of vacant homes nearby. We see if there is access to commercial businesses and nonprofits too.

We also have parents report on the relationships they have with their neighbors to see how cohesive their communities are. We are trying to understand how families are working together to promote youth resilience and how neighborhoods could be leveraged to promote parent resilience, with downstream consequences for youth resilience. We also consider biological mechanisms such as how genetics and environments might be interacting.

Q: How do you want people to feel when they come in here?

A: Happy and excited. Generally, the kids are just that because they get to play with cool toys and games.

When the families leave, we hear how excited they are and ask when they can come back. That always feels like a really big win because sometimes what we’re asking them about can be a little boring for them, but it is really important for research. We always try to make the space warm and welcoming.

The paintings behind me were actually painted by our undergrads last year at our end-of-the-year party, and they donated their artwork to the lab. Having pieces created by the undergrads, who help collect the data and interact with the families, shows our character in the lab of being a little bit more fun and inviting.

And, of course, lots of snacks for everyone.

We also have dad jokes and positive affirmations that people can take off our wall. It’s just, like, free positive vibes they can take with them. I definitely want kids and their families, as well as our students, to leave feeling positive, valued, and respected. That’s my ultimate and top priority.

Q: Do you have a favorite quote on the wall?

A: Of the ones up here now, I like this one that says, “A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new.”

I always tell my students that because, sometimes, they can get really upset when mistakes are made, but I just say it shows that they’re trying. Making mistakes is part of learning.

Q: What is something in here that is important to your work, but it’s something people may not notice?

A: One thing that people don’t realize that is really difficult in any family-based research is the amount of training that goes into it. When people come into the lab, and the visit goes smoothly, it took so much dedication and time on the staff and students’ part to get there.

There are four people who run the visits, plus a supervisor that makes sure everything’s flowing on time, and you just don’t see how much time and energy and training went into ironing that out. We wouldn’t be able to do what we’re doing without our team and their incredible effort. That dedication to honing their craft isn’t something you really see; you only see the outcome.

Right now, we have 22 undergrads, 1 graduate student, and 1 full-time staff member in the lab who are helping across lab projects, and it’s been so great to see them grow in their skill set. And it’s been really nice getting to know them; I get to hear about their goals and their dreams for the future, and we have a lot of conversations about how to achieve those.

I wish I had an experience like this during my undergrad, so I feel so grateful that it’s something my lab can provide to them. They’re just such a positive, wonderful group of human beings.

Over the past two decades, in particular, democracies all over the world have struggled with a lack of clear support. Democracy scholars have referred to these challenges as evidence of backsliding, where political institutions slowly erode from within by backing away from democratic rules and norms and abandoning pro-democratic behavior. This phenomenon has many political and social scientists concerned.

One indicator of a democracy’s health is how satisfied a country’s citizens are with their system of government, and how committed they are to making it successful. And, depending on how happy citizens feel about it, they will behave accordingly — either by participating in democratic processes and living out democratic ideals, or not.

Democratic dissatisfaction predicts lower civic engagement

On that point, a study recently published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found that dissatisfaction with democracy resulted in lower support for democratic behaviors in Mexico, according to development economist and co-author Enrique Seira Bejarano of the University of Notre Dame. Seira, the Joe and Deborah Loughrey Professor of Economics, studies how economic issues can be caused by malfunctioning political institutions and how democracy benefits and spurs economic growth in a country.

Surveying more than 50,000 Mexican citizens across 6,300 electoral precincts during Mexico’s 2017 state elections, Seira and his research team found that low levels of satisfaction led to a reluctance to participate in these separate democratic activities: attending poll worker training — a requirement for citizens during elections — staffing a polling station on Election Day, and voting in the presidential elections a year later.

“We find that dissatisfaction with democracy predicts lower democratic engagement across all three behaviors,” Seira and his co-authors wrote. Rather than relying on self-reported behaviors or country-level comparisons, the researchers studied the link between satisfaction with democracy and democratic behaviors at the individual level, merging administrative measures and analysis to create original data.

The research indicated that the more dissatisfied the citizens were, the less they engaged. Those who report the lowest level of satisfaction — in other words, surveyed as “not at all satisfied” — were 4.6% less likely to attend the poll worker training, nearly 12% less likely to staff their polling station, and 2% less likely to turn out to vote.

Based on data from the Integrated Values Surveys, Mexico ranks 54 out of 75 democratic countries in average levels of dissatisfaction with democracy, according to the study. This suggests that there are numerous other countries struggling with the same challenges — if not more so — than Mexico.

“Both globally and in Latin America, citizens’ satisfaction with democracy has decreased by 10 to 15 percentage points since 2010,” the researchers wrote.

Relatedly, in the United States, the share of citizens who think it is essential to live in a democracy is 71% for those born in the 1930s, versus 29% for those born in the 1980s, noted Seira and his co-authors.

“Support for democracy as measured in surveys — which has been on a more than a decade-long decline — is worrisome since it is associated with a decline in civic behaviors,” Seira said.

How corruption erodes trust, diminishes support

But what causes citizens to lose favor with their system of government and way of life?

According to Seira, who is also a faculty fellow at Notre Dame’s Kellogg Institute for International Studies, part of the Keough School of Global Affairs, there are several potential reasons. One is that American voters and those in other latitudes are growing impatient with the gridlock in Congress and how the government struggles to accomplish goals and objectives. Another possibility is that the welfare state has been retreating in the world since the financial crisis of 2008, and citizens place blame on their democratic governments for causing some of that downfall. A third possibility is the influence of social media causing polarization in societies, both in the U.S. and abroad, making it harder for democracies to function.

Yet another possibility — and one that has received less attention — is that citizens increasingly perceive corruption (the use of public office for private gain) as endemic. “The fraction of Americans who think the U.S. government is corrupt has been increasing and is now close to 70% — and, surprisingly, it is on the same level as democracies in Latin America,” Seira said.

This statistic led Seira and his co-authors to conduct a second study around democracy — this one looking at whether and how government corruption leads to further civic disengagement. Seira and fellow researchers from MIT and Stanford studied 17 Latin American countries using both a field experiment and tens of thousands of surveys collected over a decade.

In their working paper, Seira and his team found that when citizens were exposed to high-level politicians’ scandals, individual voter turnout causally decreased by 10–20 percentage points. In addition, contributions to support elections, and honesty and trust between individual citizens, all suffered. Furthermore, voting was affected the most when incumbents perceived to be honest were implicated in corruption cases close to election time.

“When they hear about these scandals involving high-level officials such as presidents, cabinet members, prime ministers and justices, voters are less likely to turn out to vote by 20 percentage points,” Seira said. “When a president steals, citizens don't just lose faith in that president — they lose faith in democracy itself.

“And we show it causally,” Seira explained. “Watching real footage of top politicians taking cash cut actual voter turnout by up to 27% and lowered support for democracy. Democracy is built on the promise of political equality, and corruption undermines that very promise.”

Citizens’ willingness to donate time to support the organizations of democracy — by volunteering to be an electoral observer, for example — decreased by 43% (relative to the 4.9% who volunteered on average). It similarly reduced their willingness to donate money in support of election activities by 16% (relative to 22.8% who donated). Even more worrisome, the researchers discovered, is that when top-level politicians participated in corrupt activities, explicit support for democracy reduced in favor of authoritarianism.

Seira said that the media plays a big role in highlighting political scandals.

“The number of news stories about corruption have tripled in Spanish and doubled in English in the last 20 years, which just means that more of these events are in the public eye than they used to be,” he said.

This visibility creates an unfortunate tradeoff, one for which a solution needs to be found, Seira said. On the one hand, public disclosure forces accountability and denouncement of such behavior, which is needed for democracies to work. On the other, when citizens see that the system is corrupt at the highest levels, then it can be very damaging to the credibility of the system itself. The culprit may be not that corruption is disclosed, but that it goes unpunished, as is often the case in Latin America and other developing countries.

In the field experiment part of the study, Seira and his colleagues found not only that corruption undermined citizens’ trust in democratic institutions, but trust in one another also suffered, with citizens less willing to entrust neighbors with money in incentivized lab-in-the-field experiments. In addition, exposing citizens to footage of their politicians taking bribes made it seem like such behavior was acceptable, prompting individuals to steal money the researchers endowed them with.

Can better civics education help?

Providing ample and relevant civics education to the next generation may be one way to strengthen democracy while combating dissatisfaction and corruption, Seira believes. Because the effectiveness of civics courses has not been widely tested yet, Seira and his co-authors are currently conducting research through a multi-country study of the effects of civics education on democratic behaviors.

“What we want to know is how effective these courses are,” Seira said. “Do they generate more informed citizens? Does it allow them to critically assess the alternatives to democracy? Are they more willing to donate time and effort to support democracy? And to what extent can we make better citizens through education?”

Seira noted that even though the first two studies were conducted in Mexico and Latin America, respectively, and were not specifically reliant on U.S. data, parallels can be drawn between the regions and in how survey participants would have responded. The third study is ongoing and is supported by a Democracy Catalyst Grant from the University of Notre Dame’s Democracy Initiative.

Contact: Tracy DeStazio, associate director of media relations, 574-631-9958 or tdestazi@nd.edu

Originally published by Tracy DeStazio at news.nd.edu on August 11, 2026.

At Notre Dame, he’s building on the University’s tradition of educating both the heart and the mind while preparing students to think deeply, engage new ideas, and lead with purpose.

Join us for this episode of For Good as Dean Scheve reflects on the enduring role of Arts & Letters at Notre Dame, the College’s growing commitment to global education and research that serves the common good, and why a liberal arts education remains one of the best foundations for leadership and service in a changing world.

Cárdenas was born in post-World War II California, and the discrimination he faced as a Mexican American largely shaped his trajectory as a sociologist and scholar in Latino studies.

For more than five decades, Cárdenas devoted his life to expanding educational opportunity, advancing scholarship, and supporting artists and their work. He worked to ensure that future generations of artists, scholars, and community leaders would recognize the richness and importance of Latino history, culture, and the institutions that reflected them. He has made a significant national impact, with articles highlighting his life and legacy published in the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, and the Austin American-Statesman.

“Gil was one of the founders of Latino studies at Notre Dame. Ever since his arrival from the University of Texas, he recognized its importance, especially at a global Catholic research university, and devoted himself to its development,” said John T. McGreevy, the Charles and Jill Fischer Provost. “We share in the sadness of his death but also honor his many achievements."

As a young man, Cárdenas was involved in the Chicano Movement, and his activism connected him with leaders across movements for civil rights, labor justice, educational equity, and immigrant rights. This experience continued throughout his life, during which he served on presidential commissions, testified before Congress, and sat on national boards to ensure Latino communities had a place at the table wherever decisions about culture, education, and public life were made. Most notably, he was cited in Plyler v. Doe (1982), the U.S. Supreme Court decision affirming the constitutional right of undocumented children to receive a public education.

“Gilberto Cárdenas was indispensable to the development of Latino studies across the United States,” said Alex E. Chávez, associate professor of anthropology, who worked with Cárdenas as an ILS postdoctoral student. “He devoted his life to building institutions in order to advance scholarship in the U.S. Latinos, expand opportunities in education and the arts, and further civil rights causes. He was a dear friend and a beloved mentor whose generosity, kindness, and compassion knew no bounds.”

Cárdenas received his Ph.D. in sociology from Notre Dame in 1975. During his time as a student, he studied under professor Julián Samora and co-authored Los Mojados: The Wetback Story, which redefined the study of immigration and Mexican American experiences. After graduation, he joined the faculty at the University of Texas at Austin and built up the Inter-University Program for Latino Research (IUPLR), the oldest national consortium focused on Latino research. He authored, co-authored, and co-edited dozens of books and scholarly articles during his academic career.

Cárdenas returned to Notre Dame in 1999 as a professor of sociology and relocated IUPLR to campus. Upon his return, he was also appointed the founding director of ILS. For 13 years, Cárdenas led the institute and established many of the hallmark programs and initiatives that remain today, including the academic program, the literary initiative Letras Latinas, and community engagement efforts. Through ILS, Cárdenas hoped to make Notre Dame "the premier place in the nation to study Latino populations.”

“In many respects, my work at Notre Dame would not have been possible without Gil. When I was a graduate student here, he went out of his way to support me — so much so that he offered me a job, leading to the creation of Letras Latinas. His prescient vision changed my life,” said Francisco Aragón, professor of the practice and director of Letras Latinas. “I can easily imagine this being the case for other artists and scholars who worked with him.”

Cárdenas’ impact also remains visible in the institute hallways in Bond Hall. Cárdenas was a lifelong supporter of the arts and had a particular commitment to preserving the visual history of the Chicano Movement. His collection of Latino/a/x art has become one of the most significant ever assembled, and many of the pieces are displayed throughout ILS spaces.

"From our first meeting — and for years to come — he has been a generous colleague, devoted friend, and staunch advocate for Latino studies,” said Jason Ruiz, professor of American studies and director of ILS. “The marks he made on the institute and, more broadly, in the field, are difficult to put into words, but he will be profoundly missed.”

Cárdenas is survived by his wife, Dolores Carrillo García; three children; three step-children, and nine grandchildren. A celebration of his life will be announced at a later date by the family.

As the University of Notre Dame’s Democracy Initiative approaches its fourth year, Inaugural Director David Campbell, the Packey J. Dee Professor of American Democracy, is preparing to transition leadership of the initiative to renowned political scientist Ken Kollman, the Dr. William M. Scholl Professor of Politics in the Department of Political Science and the Keough School of Global Affairs. Kollman began a six-month term as director-designate on July 1 and will formally take over as Democracy Initiative director on Jan. 1.

“David Campbell has done a superb job as founding director — developing a vision, building partnerships and turning an early idea into a thriving, University-wide endeavor,” said John T. McGreevy, the Charles and Jill Fischer Provost. “Under his leadership, the Democracy Initiative has advanced cutting-edge research, supported the recruitment of excellent scholar-teachers, expanded opportunities for students, helped realize a transformative $55 million gift for the Rooney Democracy Institute, and convened thought leaders to tackle urgent and complex challenges to democracy around the world.”

The Library of Congress recently named Campbell to the Kluge Chair in American Law and Governance, a prestigious research appointment focused on legal, constitutional and political issues related to the institutions of American government. During the spring 2027 residential appointment, he will make use of the world’s largest law library and the Library of Congress’ unique collection of manuscripts on the formation and development of the American Republic, and take advantage of opportunities to participate in ongoing dialogue with political leaders on matters of importance to civic life.

Kollman, an alumnus of Notre Dame, joined the faculty in January after 32 years at the University of Michigan. His distinguished record of scholarship includes award-winning books and journal articles, more than $47 million in external research funding, and key contributions to the development of major publicly available datasets used by researchers around the world.

“I’m confident that Ken Kollman is the right choice to lead the Democracy Initiative into this next chapter,” McGreevy said. “He is a leading scholar in both American and comparative politics, a gifted teacher, and an experienced administrator who has served in numerous leadership roles at Michigan, including as the director of the International Institute and director of the Center for Political Studies.”

Democracy was one of the first three campus-wide initiatives launched as part of “Notre Dame 2033: A Strategic Framework.” It works to renew the strength of democracy in the U.S. and around the world by advancing rigorous research, preparing students for civic leadership, and convening influential voices across political divides.

Together with his team, Campbell, who was recently elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, launched the successful Democracy Talks series, created an undergraduate Democracy Fellows program, and created the Democracy Catalyst grant program. To date, the program has funded nearly 70 faculty and graduate student projects that will produce dozens of new books, articles, convenings and courses on the subject of democracy. He also worked to build deeper connections between the Rooney Institute and the Kellogg Institute for International Studies, as well as other democracy-related institutes, centers, and programs across campus. Learn more at go.nd.edu/democracy.

Originally published by Kate Garry at news.nd.edu on July 22, 2026.

The Library of Congress has named David Campbell, the Packey J. Dee Professor of American Democracy at the University of Notre Dame, to the Kluge Chair in American Law and Governance, a prestigious research appointment focused on legal, constitutional, and political issues related to the institutions of American government.

The spring 2027 residential chair position will enable Campbell to make use of the world’s largest law library and the Library of Congress’ unique collection of manuscripts on the formation and development of the American Republic, while providing opportunities for ongoing dialogue with political leaders on matters of importance to civic and political life.

One of five Kluge Chairs articulated in the founding documents of the John W. Kluge Center, the Chair in American Law and Governance is awarded to “scholars of great accomplishment chosen for their intellectual and communicative abilities.” Previous chairs include Gary Gerstle, the Paul Mellon Professor of American History Emeritus at the University of Cambridge; Suzanne Mettler, the John L. Senior Professor of American Institutions at Cornell University; and Jacob Hacker, the Stanley Resor Professor of Political Science at Yale.

“Holding the Kluge Chair is truly an honor,” Campbell said. “The Library of Congress is one of America’s best ideas — a civic institution dedicated to fostering knowledge and inquiry. I look forward to spending time in this unique incubator of scholarship.”

A renowned scholar of civic and political engagement, Campbell’s work has advanced the understanding of how American attitudes toward religion have changed over the past 60 years, why secularization has rapidly advanced due to politics, and how women holding public office inspires political engagement among young people.

During his time in residence, he will work on a project titled “Kids These Days: The Civic Education of America’s Teens,” in which he will examine what, when, and how young people learn about democracy — at home, at school, in their communities, and online.

“David Campbell is an exceptional scholar of American politics, as his many accolades indicate — but he is also an essential thought leader who is pursuing solutions to strengthen American democracy in a polarized era,” said Kenneth Scheve, the I.A. O’Shaughnessy Dean of the College of Arts & Letters and Keough-Hesburgh Professor of Political Science at Notre Dame.

Campbell is the author or co-author of five books, including American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us, with Robert D. Putnam (Simon & Schuster, 2010), which won book awards from the American Political Science Association and the Religion Communicators Council. His other books include Why We Vote: How Schools and Communities Shape Our Civic Life (Princeton, 2006) and Secular Surge: A New Fault Line in American Politics, with John C. Green and Geoffrey C. Layman (Cambridge, 2021), which won the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion’s Distinguished Book Award and was runner-up for the APSA’s Hubert Morken Award for the Best Book on Religion and Politics.

His most recent book, with Christina Wolbrecht, is See Jane Run: How Women Politicians Matter for Young People (University of Chicago, 2025). He has written or co-written 20 book chapters and 38 peer-reviewed journal articles and edited three collected volumes.

He was recently elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the nation’s oldest learned societies and independent policy research centers. In February, the academy published a guide, titled “Preparing Students for Civic Life: A Guide for Higher Education Leaders,” developed by a group of university presidents, faculty, and civic experts, led by Campbell.

Campbell holds a bachelor’s degree from Brigham Young University and a master’s and Ph.D. from Harvard University. He joined the Notre Dame faculty in 2002 and has held multiple leadership positions on campus, including chair of the Department of Political Science from 2015 to 2021 and director of what is now known as the Rooney Democracy Institute from 2009 to 2015. He currently serves as director of the Democracy Initiative, an interdisciplinary research, education, and policy effort focused on advancing solutions to sustain and strengthen global democracy, which launched in 2023.

Campbell is a go-to expert and op-ed author for major media outlets seeking perspective and commentary on American politics and religion, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Associated Press, and The Conversation. He is the previous recipient of an Andrew Carnegie Fellowship, and his research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the Templeton Foundation, and the Spencer Foundation.

Originally published by Notre Dame News at news.nd.edu on July 20, 2026.

Stark statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention also indicate that since 1999, approximately 860,000 people have died from an opioid overdose, with nearly 318,000 of those deaths attributable to prescription opioids. In 2024, 73.4 percent of drug overdose deaths were attributable to opioids, with 65.1 percent of those deaths from illegally made fentanyls, according to the CDC.

While much of the focus of the opioid litigation and public conversation in recent years has been on the role of the pharmaceutical industry and how its advertising campaigns led to an increase in opioid use and subsequent overdose deaths, there is more to the story behind this nationwide catastrophe.

Researchers at the University of Notre Dame found that doctors had a hand in fueling the opioid crisis by aggressively prescribing opioids to treat chronic pain. Their work shows the extent to which doctors’ prescribing practices can be linked to that increase, indicating that if there had not been such a strong push on the part of physicians, opioid-related death rates would have been much lower.

According to William Evans and Ethan Lieber, both from Notre Dame’s Department of Economics and co-authors of an article published in the Journal of Human Resources, physicians began prescribing opioids to treat chronic pain more extensively and more often in the late 1990s. If their prescription practices had stayed at their 1995 levels, there would have been 43 percent fewer deaths by 2015, just two decades later.

The duo’s work has the potential to guide conversations about reeducating doctors on the appropriate use of opioids for pain relief and reframing how medical schools teach future doctors about appropriate prescribing practices.

“Most of the people who have followed this issue acknowledge that the changing prescribing practices of doctors played a critical role in the drug crisis,” said Evans, the Keough-Hesburgh Professor of Economics and co-founder of Notre Dame’s Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities. “I think we’ve come up with a nice way to quantify the impact, and it is massive.”

To track physicians’ practice of overprescribing opioids as pain medication, Evans and Lieber first examined the county characteristics in 1990 that predicted the surge in drug deaths beginning in the early 2000s. They identified one factor that is particularly predictive for whether the county will eventually have a severe drug poisoning crisis: the fraction of the working age population receiving Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI).

These benefits are for adults who have worked for a minimum of time in jobs covered by Social Security and who have a medical condition limiting their ability to maintain gainful employment. The co-authors showed that not only are those on SSDI in more pain than average, but those in high SSDI rate geographies also have higher levels of pain. Their work shows that as physicians became more aggressive at treating chronic pain with opioids, these high-SSDI, high-pain areas had, on average, a much more severe drug poisoning crisis.

Historically, opioids had only been prescribed for those post-surgical and cancer patients experiencing acute pain, leaving those with chronic pain untreated. Starting in the mid-1990s, however, there was a reevaluation of the use of opioids to treat chronic pain. In 1995, the co-authors noted, the medical community established the notion that pain was the “fifth vital sign,” specifically measuring pain levels and equating pain relief with quality of care. In that same year, medical experts released a statement advocating the use of opioids for chronic pain relief. As a result, physicians took note and became more aggressive in their prescribing of those drugs.

Using data from the National Ambulatory Medical Care Surveys from 1980 through 2015, Evans and Lieber demonstrated that prior to 1995, only about 7 percent of patients visiting a doctor with a condition likely to generate chronic pain received an opioid prescription. After 1995, this number increased dramatically, reaching 25 percent by 2015.

“We were struck by how much these numbers changed over time and how the timing coincided with the efforts to encourage greater use of opioids to treat chronic pain,” said Lieber, the Dillon Hall Associate Professor in Notre Dame’s Department of Economics.

Evans added that the American Medical Association dropped the use of pain as the fifth vital sign in 2016, noting that “the president of the AMA said at the time that physicians played a key role in the epidemic and now they must do their part to end it.”

The study takes into account other factors that potentially drive drug poisoning death rates, such as local economic conditions, general access to health services, the decline of institutions like manufacturing jobs and relationships, the rise and marketing of opioid drugs like OxyContin, and prescription drug monitoring programs.

A key data set in their work was the Drug Enforcement Administration’s Automation of Reports and Consolidated Orders System (ARCOS), which tracks shipments of opioids from manufacturers to points of sale or distribution. Detailed transaction-level data from ARCOS was released as part of the opioid litigation.

In 2024, Notre Dame developed a user-friendly interface of the ARCOS database, which enables public access to more than 10 years of national controlled substance transaction information for 14 different opioids.

This research stems from the Notre Dame Population Analytics (ND Pop), a data-focused research effort fostering and advancing multidisciplinary work on a wide range of pressing demographic issues facing society. Evans leads ND Pop, which is facilitated by a partnership between the University’s Poverty Initiative and the College of Arts & Letters.

To hear Evans and Lieber discuss their research, check out the Economics: Applied podcast, hosted by the Hoover Institution.

Contact: Tracy DeStazio, associate director of media relations, 574-631-9958 or tdestazi@nd.edu

Originally published by Tracy DeStazio at news.nd.edu on July 16, 2026.