Careers

Our students are the embodiment of Notre Dame’s College of Arts and Letters’ motto: they study everything so that they can do anything that their future careers demand. Graduates of Notre Dame’s Classics program enjoy success in a variety of careers. While many pursue graduate degrees in law, medicine, or education, others go on to trade stocks on Wall Street, decipher documents for the CIA, or teach high school Latin. Recent graduates have continued their studies at prestigious universities like the University of Oxford, Yale, University of Chicago, Stanford, UC-Berkeley, USC, University of Wisconsin-Madison, UT-Austin, UVA, IU-Bloomington, and Bryn Mawr.

“Studying Classics requires you to engage with foundational questions about justice, rhetoric, governance, and the human condition, and that engagement shapes the way you think. Even when the content is not directly relevant to what I am working on, the act of studying it exercises the same mental muscles I rely on professionally, such as close reading, careful reasoning, building an argument from limited information, and tolerating ambiguity. On a more personal level, I think those same habits of mind support genuine self-reflection and self-awareness. For those who are spiritually inclined, as I am, that kind of reflective practice resonates deeply. I also believe that same exercise strengthened my ability to be attuned in my relationships and more effective in the way I engage with others.”