The University of Notre Dame Press was established on August 17, 1949, and we have much to celebrate during our 75th anniversary year. While we are enormously proud of our accomplishments since our founding, our vision and ambition for the future are even greater.
Since its inception, Notre Dame Press has established an intellectually innovative, globally influential, and financially sustainable publishing program. Beyond the books we publish, we have pioneered new educational programming and publishing curriculum for students and faculty, and we have dramatically expanded the reach and impact of our publications. Over the years, the Press has evolved into a vital partner of Our Lady’s University, and it continues to fill an essential role in scholarly research and communication both on campus and around the world.
I hope you’ll join us in celebrating the Press’s historical successes, but our team is setting our sights even higher. By 2033, the University of Notre Dame has committed itself to becoming “the leading global Catholic research university, on par with but distinct from the world’s best private universities.” We believe that the leading global Catholic research university deserves a world class university press that advances human understanding and cultivates the best in Catholic intellectual endeavors.
As the largest Catholic university press in the world, based at the only religious university with membership in the Association of American Universities, it is imperative for Notre Dame Press to achieve excellence as a publisher; to establish preeminence in its core publishing areas of religion, philosophy, and political science; and to enhance its standing in the areas of history, Latin American studies, and medieval studies.
I am delighted to present our 2024–2025 strategic framework that outlines these goals and our roadmap to achieve them. We have reaffirmed our aspirations to curate, produce, and disseminate exceptional and diverse scholarship, to nourish the Catholic intellectual tradition, and to invest in the future careers of both scholars and students. We will pursue new avenues to amplify the University’s areas of institutional excellence, and we will increase our engagement with the campus and South Bend communities. We will also develop strategies to wisely steward our financial resources and generate new revenue streams, while also cultivating our most essential resource—our team members—by creating further opportunities for them to develop and flourish.
Each objective presented in the strategic framework is paired with specific, actionable strategies that our team will undertake to pursue simultaneously the greater ambitions of the Press and the University. A primary goal articulated in the plan is to build toward sustainably and strategically enhancing the size, reputation, and influence of the Press over the next five years. This growth will have a direct impact on research, scholarship, and learning around the world.
Academic research and learning cannot exist in isolation, and Notre Dame Press plays a central role in the global knowledge ecosystem. Our books connect the work of individual scholars and experts with researchers, teachers, students, librarians, and the other members of the academic community. In a world facing increasing political, religious, and economic divisions, these connections are all the more essential.
With the expertise of our authors and staff and our solid foundation within the Catholic intellectual tradition, the Press is uniquely poised to publish and promote innovative, significant, and diverse scholarship in the pursuit of greater knowledge and understanding. We could not have come so far without the support of our authors, campus partners, donors, and readers. We are grateful for your support and friendship over the past 75 years, and I hope you will join us as we strive for even greater achievements in the decades to come.
Stephen M. Wrinn
Director
University of Notre Dame Press