The Community of Dunne Hall
The tone of Dunne Hall is set the minute you walk in the door. There, a large plaque on the wall reads:
"As freshmen in 1974, Jimmy Dunne, Jim Martin, Johnny Coyne, Rich Riley and Stan 'The Doc' Ziherl lived on the first floor of Alumni Hall. They became close friends and stayed that way ever since.
They ask you to please look around: this is an extraordinary opportunity to make memories and forge enduring bonds. As life progresses, the friends you make here will serve as a bedrock and perpetual source of peace, continuity and laughter.
The University of Notre Dame bestows many blessings of both the spirit and mind. The friendships formed here will have an equally lasting and profound impact. Cherish your friends.
This Hall is meant as an expression of gratitude from five college roommates with sincere wishes that every student who passes through these halls has the good fortune of true friendship."
Though the hall is young - it opened in 2016- its community is strong. Already the hall boasts two Hall of the Year awards, two valedictorians, one of the largest retreats on campus with more than 100 attendees, and signature events that have nearly every member of the community signing up.
But there's also fun infused in the day-to-day life of the dorm. The band at mass has dubbed itself "the Jam of God." As a nod to the television series "The Office," the dorm hosts annual Dunnedies where they give awards to the Dorm Dad and the Gymmy Dunne award for the person who loves the dorm gym. And when they twice made the interhall football championship, they rallied a pep band from within their ranks to support each other. Silliness aside, the fun is an exhibit of great camaraderie and trust among a group of 220 men, two priests and an in-residence faculty couple, John and Karen Deak.
Rev. Eric Schimmel, C.S.C., the current rector of Dunne Hall, attributes much of the quick success to his predecessor, Rev. Matt Kuczora, C.S.C., who gave the initial transplants to the dorm freedom to build a rich community as they saw fit and the safety net to try things, even if they didn't work out. Those initial students, he continues, relished the challenge of building new traditions and a new community, which isn't always the case in a new dorm.
The men of Dunne Hall, or the Sentinels, a moniker earned by their proximity to the east gate of campus, are also encouraged to live out the dorm motto: "Potentia Videre Fortitudo Agere," or "the competence to see and the courage to act." The motto, taken from the Constitutions of the Congregation of Holy Cross, encourages the residents to both celebrate and support one another, says Fr. Schimmel, largely following the model of Jesus.
"Jesus didn't come just to save isolated individuals. He came to save all of us. And he gathered people together as a community. He spent a lot of time around people who were vulnerable and struggling because they needed it the most and to model for us, when you're doing well, you need to be attentive to the people who aren't."
Dunne and his friends are known to return to campus, especially for Dunne Hall's event "The Feast," which features Mass, a suit-and-tie private dinner at South Dining Hall, and inspirational speakers. Among those have been Dunne's crew who have shared not only their successes, but their authentic struggles along the way. That honesty, Fr. Schimmel notes, is important to undergraduates still trying to figure things out.
"These types of events and the way the dorm is structured is to rejoice in the successes, but also to recognize we can be vulnerable, how to be vulnerable, how to support each other, that builds the heart and the soul. Notre Dame is not about just educating the mind, it's about educating the heart, as the quote from Basil Moreau and our mission statement says," Fr. Schimmel says. "As a mission within residential life, yes, we definitely want to help support people academically and find their career paths, but we want people to grow as human beings, to develop all their talents, their gifts, and their skills, and to recognize their human dignity. And these events help in a tremendous way."