Our Mission

The Center for Social Concerns of the University of Notre Dame facilitates community-based learning, research and service informed by Catholic Social Tradition. Through the Center, learning becomes service to justice.

The Center for Social Concerns is an institute at the University of Notre Dame. It reports to the Office of the Provost.

Our Vision

The Mission of the Center for Social Concerns fully realized. View an illustration of our vision.

STUDENTS
All students demonstrate a “ disciplined sensibility to poverty and injustice” through social concerns courses integrated in all colleges. Students participate extensively in program development, drawing on comprehensive leadership training for service and social action. Students strategize regularly with partners at other colleges and universities.

COMMUNITY PARTNERS
Responses to the voices of persons in need lead to collaborative strategies for social change. Community concerns foster and inform strategic initiatives and action research.

FACULTY
Joint appointments with each of the Colleges and First Year of Studies are central to teaching and research of faculty. Strategic research efforts linked to student and community initiatives are common and fruitful.

NOTRE DAME PARTNERS
The commitment to service and justice by Notre Dame attracts an abundance of students, faculty and staff seeking the challenge of experiential and service learning. The Center’s mission is lived out through University appointments, funding, course offerings, residence life and contributions to Notre Dame’s Catholic identity and mission.

ALUMNI/ALUMNAE
Collaborations among alumni and alumnae, students and local agencies foster continuing learning about complex social realities. Graduates recognize injustice, integrate Catholic social teachings, and work for positive social change and justice.

GLOBAL PARTNERS
Community partners provide service-learning opportunities on every continent. Links of solidarity foster understanding of international poverty and injustice and inspire the life and hope of community that transcend borders.

...the University seeks to cultivate in its students not only an appreciation for the great achievements of human beings but also a disciplined sensibility to the poverty, injustice and oppression that burden the lives of so many. The aim is to create a sense of human solidarity and concern for the common good that will bear fruit as learning becomes service to justice. —University of Notre Dame Mission Statement