Notre Dame Calls DEI ‘Equally Important’ As Catholicism In Hiring Decisions

The University of Notre Dame’s top academic officer told faculty that hiring women and minorities is “equally important” to the school’s mission as hiring Catholics.

John McGreevy, the university’s provost, outlined the hiring priorities in a faculty-wide Jan. 17 email obtained by the National Catholic Register. The provost argued the “complexity of our mission” called for Notre Dame to implement a new hiring guide, slated to go into effect July 1, to “evaluate candidates equitably.”

“One important goal is to hire Catholic faculty and other faculty deeply committed to our mission to ensure continuity with our past and our future as the world’s leading global Catholic research university,” McGreevy wrote. “A second overlapping and equally important goal is to increase the number of women and underrepresented minorities on our faculty so that we become the diverse and inclusive intellectual community our mission urges us to be.”

The email prompted Scott Yenor, a political scientist at Boise State University, to write an extensive analysis of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies at Notre Dame for the Claremont Institute. His report estimated the university hosted 167 DEI-related events and spent roughly $6 million on diversity personnel salaries in 2024.

In announcing the university’s DEI “task force” in 2021, Father John Jenkins, Notre Dame’s president until 2024, said “only in this way can we live up to our Catholic mission.”