Dear Colleagues and Friends,
Happy New Year! As we welcome 2025, I’m excited to reflect on the achievements of 2024 and share a glimpse of what’s ahead for Notre Dame’s College of Engineering.
This fall, we celebrated a significant milestone in our undergraduate program: female students now make up nearly 40% of both our first-year and sophomore engineering classes—a step toward building a more inclusive future for the profession. We also welcomed 13 new faculty members, who are already enriching our programs and fostering new collaborations. Early in 2025, we will launch a Society of Engineering Fellows Program, which will support our postdoctoral scholars in producing high-impact research and advancing their careers.
Notre Dame Engineering is honored to have helped launch Notre Dame’s new Just Transformations to Sustainability Initiative, inspired by Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato si'. This initiative seeks to address the accelerating challenges posed by climate change and its impact on food security, energy, water resources, and the built environment through interdisciplinary collaboration that combines research, education, and the preparation of the next generation of sustainability leaders.
Our student teams excelled on national stages: the IrishSat team earned first place in NASA’s Starshade Challenge, the Notre Dame Rocketry Team was declared the overall winner at NASA’s 2024 University Student Launch Initiative, and the AIMM team took home the Grand Champion title at the inaugural AI-controlled boat competition.
