When Catherine Ruth Pakaluk received her Ph.D. in economics in 2010 from Harvard University, it was an easy decision to accept a job offer from Ave Maria University. Besides the evident personal attractions—such as living in a terrific community just a bike-ride away from campus, where it would be easy to raise her six young children, aged 2 to 11—she was attracted to the possibilit...

The new major in Global Affairs and International Business gives students the intellectual foundation to think about global interactions.  The program coordinator, Dr. Gabriel Martinez, is an economist specializing in global economic interactions, particularly the effect of the quality of institutions on living standards across countries.

We know that we live in a "globali...

On campus and among students, Dr. Travis Curtright is known for a lively, engaging classroom and for teaching and directing Shakespeare’s plays. A popular professor, the class of 2012 elected him as their faculty speaker for graduation.

Also an active scholar, Dr. Curtright is author of a new book, The One Thomas More, which is forthcoming from the Catholic Univers...

In the summer of A.D. 113, Ignatius, bishop of Antioch was chained to a detachment of ten imperial soldiers and led on a trek of some 1,500 miles from his episcopal see in Syria westward to Rome, where he was to be thrown to the lions. As the entourage crossed Asia Minor (modern Turkey), Ignatius was allowed to meet with the leaders of several local churches and to w...

Even the casual follower of academic science and industry R&D will recognize that most areas of scientific inquiry are quickly becoming interdisciplinary in nature. The reason for this is both simple and exciting. Technology and broad experimental proficiency have allowed the scientist to start asking bigger, more complex questions. The tools of molecular biology and genetics are helping in...

The English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge is widely known for his famous poems "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" and "Kubla Khan". The familiar term "psychosomatic," and the phrase "the willing suspension of disbelief," have passed into popular modern usage, while most are unaware of their origin in Coleridge. In fact, Coleridge, along with his friend and collaborator William Wordsworth, who tog...

The Psychology Major at Ave Maria University is off to an auspicious start.  While offering a standard psychology curriculum, the study of psychology at Ave Maria is based upon a foundation that integrates the wisdom of philosophy and the treasury of Catholic theological anthropology with the theory, research, and practice of the discipline of psychology.  This is presented most expli...

As 2012 came to an end, Professors Rodriguez and Kelly settled up on a gentlemen's wager that was made as the year began. Rodriguez had predicted that the Higgs particle -- whether it exists or not -- would not be found among the data taken at the LHC during 2012, while Kelly held the opinion that the Higgs would make an incontrovertible appearance. In July, CERN announced that a particle "just...

Political Economy and Government, a truly exciting new major, brings together the disciplines of politics and economics to explore their mutually supportive dimensions.  It provides students, as aspiring policy-makers, with the ability to understand the importance of institutions in shaping public policy as well as the sometimes agonizing trade-offs involved in responsible decision-making....

Friendship and the Good Life

Dr. Michael Pakaluk, the Chairman of the Philosophy department, is known for his work on the philosophy of friendship.  In a recent interview, he explained how he became interested in the subject and why it is important.
Pakaluk: I wrote my dissertation on friendship at Harvard, and I can remember the exact moment when I d...