The University educates a diverse population at both undergraduate and graduate levels. In addition to the Women's College, the University includes a College of Graduate Studies, College of Adult Undergraduate Studies for working women and men, English Language Institute and Renaissance Institute for senior citizens. These programs provide educational experiences emphasizing professional and personal knowledge, development and integrity. The University is organized into four academic schools: Arts and Sciences, Education, Nursing, and Pharmacy. The School of Pharmacy, offering a four-year doctor of pharmacy degree, was established in 2008. It is the first school of pharmacy in the United States affiliated with a women’s college and the second school of pharmacy in the state of Maryland.
History and Mission
Notre Dame of Maryland University was founded as a college on September 9, 1895 and officially transitioned to university status on September 9, 2011. Notre Dame of Maryland embraces the vision of its founders, the School Sisters of Notre Dame (SSND), and is committed to “educating leaders to transform the world.” The University provides a liberal arts education in the Catholic tradition and was the first U.S. Catholic college for women to grant the four-year baccalaureate degree. The SSND congregation continues to inform and inspire the education provided at the University, with more than 20 sisters serving on the faculty, staff, or administration and seven serving as trustees.
The Catholic tradition of the University provides the context by which intellectual dialogue is actively promoted. The guiding principle of campus life is contained in the SSND mission, which affirms that education should empower persons to reach the fullness of their potential and enable them to direct their gifts toward building the earth. The University’s values-centered education emphasizes the student’s total development—intellectual, professional, social, and spiritual. For more than a century, the University’s 20,000 graduates have built buildings and families, made scientific discoveries, run for office and marathons, served as CEOs and in soup kitchens—proving time and again the power of rising to Notre Dame’s challenge to its graduates: “Whose life will you change?”
Location
Notre Dame is located on the North Charles Street college corridor in northern Baltimore and occupies 58 wooded acres in a residential setting. The University benefits from both a beautiful campus environment and proximity to the city's businesses and transportation, as well as cultural, recreational, and professional opportunities. Notre Dame also offers classes for part-time students at sites in many of the Maryland counties including Anne Arundel, Baltimore, Carroll, Frederick, Harford, St. Mary’s, and Washington counties.
