As faculty emerge as leaders in community engagement, the Center for Social Concerns occasionally invites them to become Faculty Fellows. In general, the role of the Faculty Fellows is to link their disciplinary or multidisciplinary expertise with the Center's mission. To this end, they collaborate with Center faculty and staff in research, teaching, and advisory capacities across university departments and programs.
2019–2021 Faculty Fellows
Viva Bartkus
Associate Professor, Management & Organization
Fellow, Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace
Proessor Bartkus graduated summa cum laude from Yale University with masters and bachelors degrees in economics, and then completed her doctorate and masters in International Relations at Magdalen College, University of Oxford while on a Rhodes Scholarship. Her research and teaching interests concentrate on two distinct areas: the leadership approaches most effective in solving complex business problems and the social capital of communities that enables collaboration. She co-led a major research initiative, “The Buck Stops Here,” examining how CEOs make complex decisions. Her most recent research and teaching initiative, Business on the Frontlines, examines the impact of business in rebuilding war-torn societies and was chosen by Forbes as one of the top 10 most innovative MBA courses in the country. Since 2008, her Business on the Frontlines teams have collaborated on nearly 50 business- and peace-related projects in over twenty countries with humanitarian agencies and multi-national corporations. Dr. Bartkus has also served on the Board of Directors of Catholic Relief Services, one of the largest humanitarian organizations in the world. Prior to joining the faculty at Notre Dame, she spent ten years at McKinsey & Company.
Jay Brockman
Professor of the Practice, College of Engineering
Director, Center for Civic Innovation
Professor Brockman is the director of the Center for Civic Innovation and professional specialist in the Department of Computer Science and Engineering. He received his Sc.B. degree from Brown University in 1982 and Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon University in 1992. Brockman is a developer of Notre Dame’s college-wide first-year engineering program and the author of the textbook, Introduction to Engineering: Modeling and Problem Solving (John Wiley & Sons, 2009), which has been gaining steady adoption at universities worldwide. He was an organizer of the “Workshop on Reforming the First Year Engineering Experience,” held jointly at the University of Notre Dame and the University of Melbourne (Australia) in August 2009.
Pam Butler
Assistant Teaching Professor, Gender Studies
Associate Director and Director of Undergraduate Studies, Gender Studies
Pamela Wynne Butler, Ph.D., is associate director and director of undergraduate studies in the Gender Studies Program at the University of Notre Dame, where she teaches the Introduction to Gender Studies gateway course. Dr. Butler's research uses critical-race and transnational feminist critique to understand popular and public cultures in the United States. Her areas of expertise include U.S. histories of gender, sexuality, and empire; feminist political economy; and the carceral state. Her current book project, The Secret History of American Knitting: Entanglements of Race, Sex, and Empire, is a genealogical political history of hand-knitting in the United States since the mid-19th century.
Richard G. Jones
Associate Teaching Professor, American Studies
Walter H. Annenberg-Edmund P. Joyce Director of the Gallivan Program in Journalism, Ethics, and Democracy
Richard Jones joined Notre Dame after spending nearly 20 years working as a journalist. He led the New York Times’ newsroom summer internship program and The New York Times Student Journalism Institute, a professional development program for collegiate members of the National Association of Black Journalists and the National Association of Hispanic Journalists. He was a reporter from 2001 to 2008; in 2014, he was named associate editor. As a reporter, he wrote about topics as varied as politics, criminal justice, the New Jersey Legislature and the New York Jets. He was also nominated for a Pulitzer Prize by editors at the Times for a yearlong investigation into the failings of New Jersey’s child welfare system. Prior to joining the Times, he was a reporter at the Philadelphia Inquirer. He has previously held visiting faculty positions at New York University and the University of Delaware; as well as taught journalism at Rutgers University, American University, and the University of Maryland. Mr. Jones is a graduate of the University of Delaware and holds a master’s degree from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, where he was awarded a Knight-Bagehot Fellowship. He has also advanced to Ph.D. candidacy in journalism studies at Maryland, where he is a Scripps-Howard Doctoral Fellow. A two-time winner of The New York Times Publisher’s Award, his reporting has been honored with awards from numerous organizations.
Emmanuel Katongole
Professor of Theology and Peace Studies, Keough School of Global Affairs
Joint Appointment, Theology
Fellow, Kellogg Institute for International Studies
Emmanuel Katongole is professor of theology and peace studies. He holds a joint appointment with the Keough School of Global Affairs, where he serves as a full time faculty of the Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies. Before joining the University of Notre Dame in January 2013, he served as Associate Professor of Theology and World Christianity at Duke University, and as founding co-director of the Duke Center for Reconciliation. A member of the Contending Modernities Initiative team, Katongole coordinates an inter-disciplinary research project, which investigates how religious and secular forces compete or collaborate in shaping new modes of authority, community, and identity within the context of nation-state modalities in Africa. He is a Catholic priest of Kampala Archdiocese, Uganda where he was ordained in 1987.
Neeta Verma
Robert P. Sedlack Jr. Associate Professor of Visual Communication Design, Art, Art History, and Design
Neeta Verma is a graphic designer who views the profession of graphic design as service. Throughout her practice she has defined her role and the role of graphic design as one that serves as a catalyst within a societal context. She believes that designers have both the ability and responsibility toward a practice that is not just determined by “need” but more importantly by “relevance.” Growing up in India, a melting pot of religions, she has been fascinated by similarities and differences in the visual manifestations (architecture, artifacts, books, prayer and recitation) and the history of mark making within these religious traditions. Since 1996, she has headed a graphic design firm that works exclusively for museums, cultural organizations, not-for-profits, and educational institutions. Deeply committed to design education, she brings her rich professional experience in the industry to influence, mold, and inform the classroom experiences of her students. Her teaching focuses on Social Design, Visualization of Data, and Fundamentals of Design and the aspects she promotes within those courses are critical thinking and innovation.
Danielle Wood
Associate Professor of the Practice, College of Engineering
Associate Director for Research, Center for Civic Innovation
Danielle Wood is the associate director for research in the Center for Civic Innovation. Danielle received her Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in Urban and Regional Planning with a minor in program evaluation. Her doctoral research examined how quality of life and sustainability indicator systems have been used to facilitate policy and programmatic change in local communities.
