Welcome back! I hope that last week gave you an opportunity to take a break. 

I used the time to travel to Rome, where I had the great honor of attending a special conference convened at the Vatican on the topic of artificial intelligence (AI) and ethics. Pope Francis has made several statements on AI, recently asking: "Does it serve to satisfy the needs of humanity, to improve the well-being and integral development of people?" Or does it, rather, "serve to enrich and increase the already high power of the few technological giants despite the dangers to humanity?" 

The pope emphasizes the need for Christian morals and ethics to be integral to the evolution of the technology. I’m thankful to our faculty members who are increasing our understanding and awareness through their important research on the many facets of ethics and AI, and I hope to connect us to the many people working on artificial intelligence that I met at the conference.

In this column, I’d like to further highlight a few developments in our Undergraduate program, in follow up to Andy Wendelborn’s September column. Specifically, I want to update you on the number of students choosing to broaden their academic experience with double majors and minors, both inside and outside the College, which was a major objective of the redesign of the business core curriculum that went into effect starting with the Class of 2026 (current juniors). 

Here is the breakdown of the primary majors of current students:

Of our sophomores and juniors, 145 students declared a second business major, with nearly 69% choosing the Accountancy/Finance combination:

To round out the picture of the diverse studies of our students: 

• 26% are enrolled in business minors.
• 34% are enrolled in a second major outside of business.
• 37% are enrolled in a minor outside of business.

These percentages will increase as current Mendoza sophomores are in the process of registering for second majors and minors in and outside of Mendoza; for example, the Marketing minor and the Finance minor have only recently become available to Mendoza students.

Considering just the last two bullet points, this means that more than 71% of Mendoza students are expanding their coursework to non-business disciplines, which speaks positively to the holistic development of our students.

In important other news pertaining to our undergraduate program, earlier this month, the University's Academic Council approved a new double major program allowing Mendoza undergraduate students to study business and computer science. In a collaboration between Mendoza and the College of Engineering, the program will provide a cohort of students with the opportunity to combine any one of the Mendoza majors with a second major in computer science. Admission to the program will be through a competitive selection process with more details to come. My thanks especially to Mike Chapple for his leadership and guidance in establishing this new opportunity for our students.

The pope’s conference on AI is a reminder of the importance of continuing to evolve and innovate within our undergraduate programs as we prepare them for a future that could be far different from the present. I’m thankful to the many of you who teach and serve as administrators and advisors in Undergraduate Studies.

In Notre Dame,

Martijn