Congratulations, everyone, on completing Week One of the 2023-24 academic year! I just got back from a wonderful trip to visit family in the Netherlands and to go to the football game in Ireland. It was a really fun trip, with many meetings with alums and festivities, and, of course, a terrific football game. 

In today’s column, I am providing an update about our Undergraduate Studies Program, where our strategic goal is to provide an unsurpassed educational experience that contributes to the formation and preparation of undergraduate students who will meaningfully contribute to the world.  

The official University enrollment data will be available later this semester. Based on preliminary data, we welcomed 2,391 undergraduate students to the College, including: 

• 546 First-Year Business Intents
• 654 Sophomores
• 598 Juniors
• 593 Seniors

Of the 546 First-Year Business Intents:

• 10% are first-generation students
• 43% are female
• 12% are international

Our sophomores (Class of 2026) are the first class subject to the revised Business Core Curriculum, which is designed to be more flexible and provide greater opportunities for integration across disciplines in and outside Mendoza. The Mendoza Class of 2026 distribution of majors as of fall 2023 is as follows:

• Accountancy: 13%
• Business Analytics: 16%
• Finance: 51%
• Marketing: 13%
• Strategic Management: 7%

These percentages have been relatively stable over the past five years, as can be seen in this chart:

For the first time in the College’s history, Mendoza students in the Class of 2026 (and beyond) may now declare a second major in business. This includes Accountancy, Finance, Marketing and Strategic Management (i.e., all disciplines except Business Analytics.) The double major allows students to broaden their knowledge and specialize in a second business discipline without adding time to complete their degree.

We currently have 75 students who are double majors in business. About 88% of these declared the combination of Accountancy/Finance or Finance/Accountancy. Sophomores will have another opportunity later this semester to declare a second major.

Another exciting development in our Undergraduate Studies Program has been the addition of minors available to business students and non-business students. We offer nine minors with a total enrollment this fall of 892 students: Accounting, Business and the Common Good, Business Technology, Digital Marketing, Finance, Foundations of Business, Impact Consulting, Innovation & Entrepreneurship, and Real Estate. 

One of the new minors open to Mendoza students is Business and the Common Good. Offered through Mendoza’s Business Ethics and Society Program and directed by David O’Connor, the minor is a “uniquely Notre Dame” offering that seeks to gather an intellectual community of students and faculty who share a special interest in the philosophical and theological foundations of careers in business and citizenship in a commercial society. 

We also launched the Impact Consulting minor led by Wendy Angst. The minor, open to business majors except for those currently majoring in Strategic Management, enables students to have a meaningful impact on “wicked problems” — gender equity, access to education, poverty, climate change, energy and more. Students engage with project partners over multiple semesters to apply design thinking principles to empathize with stakeholders, co-create innovative solutions, design and test prototypes, and ultimately, build and launch concepts. 

In the past two years, we’ve made significant changes to expand students’ academic opportunities and improve their journey in the program. With this greater flexibility comes the responsibility to guide our students in choosing the courses of study that truly reflect their talents, interests and what they want to achieve in life personally, spiritually and professionally. You all play an important role in this. I am especially grateful to those in advising roles:

• Mendoza Undergraduate Studies: Andy Wendelborn, Amy Radvansky, Gina Shropshire, Lisa Heming, Jen Washko, Laura Glassford and Jessica Noffsinger.
• First-Year Advisors: Samantha Cloon, Drew Espeseth, Kristy Patterson and Sarah Priebe.
• Academic Director Amanda McKendree. 
• Department Directors of Undergraduate Studies for our business majors: Colleen Creighton (ACCT), Jim Leady (FIN), Jen Waddell (ITAO), Jennifer Cronin (M&O) and Mitch Olsen (MARK).
• Directors of Undergraduate Studies for our business minors: Colleen Creighton (ACCT), Jen Waddell (Business Tech), Mitch Olsen (Digital Marketing), Jim Leady (FIN), Laura Hollis (Foundations of Business), Wendy Angst (Impact Consulting), Sam Miller (Innovation & Entrepreneurship), Geno Acosta (Real Estate) and David O’Connor (Business & the Common Good).

To find out more about the changes in our Undergraduate Studies program, I encourage to read this article or check out the Dean’s Report 2022-2023: Undergraduate Studies (downloadable PDF or online highlights). 

In Notre Dame,

Martijn