The Texas University That Sends Almost Every Student to Rome—and Has Been Quietly Forming Catholic Leaders for 70 Years
What happens when a Catholic university makes reading Dante in the shadow of the Colosseum a requirement rather than a luxury?
Meet University of Dallas—a Catholic university in Irving, Texas, that has spent nearly seven decades proving that rigorous liberal arts education and deep Catholic identity are not just compatible but inseparable. Founded in 1956, UD is known for its legendary Core curriculum, its Rome Program that sends the vast majority of its students to study in the Eternal City, and a culture of intellectual seriousness that has produced generations of Catholic thinkers, writers, teachers, and religious.
A University Built on Conviction
The story of the University of Dallas begins in the 1950s, when the Catholic Diocese of Dallas-Fort Worth set out to establish a Catholic university for the region. In 1956, the university opened with a founding vision that was ambitious and clear: to provide a Catholic liberal education that would form students in the Western intellectual tradition while grounding them in the faith.
From the beginning, UD attracted faculty who were serious scholars and serious Catholics. The university's early decades established the intellectual culture that defines it to this day—a culture where the life of the mind and the life of faith are pursued together, without apology and without compromise.
The campus in Irving, just outside Dallas, occupies a hilltop with sweeping views of the Texas landscape—a fitting perch for an institution dedicated to seeing things from a higher vantage point.
The Core Curriculum: A Shared Intellectual Journey
At the heart of a University of Dallas education is the Core, a sequence of courses in literature, philosophy, theology, history, science, economics, and politics that every undergraduate takes regardless of major.
This is not a distribution requirement where students pick from a menu. The Core is a shared intellectual journey. Freshmen read Homer and Plato. Sophomores wrestle with Augustine and Aquinas. Juniors encounter Dante, Shakespeare, and the great modern thinkers. By the time students graduate, they have engaged with the foundational texts and ideas of Western civilization—together.
The result is a campus where students in the biology lab and students in the English seminar share a common intellectual vocabulary. A chemistry major can discuss Aristotle's metaphysics with a politics major, because both have read the text, attended the lectures, and argued about the ideas.
This shared Core creates an intellectual community that is rare in American higher education, where specialization and fragmentation have become the norm.
The Rome Program: Education in the Eternal City
If the Core is the heart of UD, the Rome Program is its soul.
The University of Dallas operates its own campus on the outskirts of Rome, and the overwhelming majority of UD sophomores spend a semester there. This is not a study-abroad program tacked on as an enrichment option. It is a defining feature of the education—so central to the UD experience that the university has maintained its Rome campus for decades.
Students in Rome take Core courses on-site, reading the great texts while surrounded by the civilization that produced them. They study Virgil while walking the Roman Forum. They read Dante while visiting the churches of Florence. They encounter Michelangelo not in a textbook but in the Sistine Chapel.
The Rome semester also includes extensive travel throughout Italy and Europe. Students visit the great cathedrals, museums, and historical sites that bring their studies to life. For many, the experience is transformative—an encounter with beauty, history, and the living Catholic tradition that reshapes how they see the world.
A Culture of Vocational Discernment
The University of Dallas has long been known for producing an unusually high number of graduates who enter religious life, the priesthood, and Catholic ministry. While the university does not track exact figures publicly, its reputation in Catholic circles is well established: UD forms young people who take their faith seriously enough to ask hard questions about vocation.
This isn't the result of pressure or recruitment. It is the natural fruit of an education that puts students in sustained contact with truth, beauty, and goodness—and with a community of peers and mentors who are asking the same questions.
Beyond religious vocations, UD graduates are well represented in Catholic media, Catholic education, theology, philosophy, law, medicine, and public life. The alumni network, while not as large as those of bigger universities, is remarkably tight-knit and influential within Catholic intellectual and professional circles.
Graduate Programs and Ongoing Influence
Beyond its undergraduate college, the University of Dallas offers graduate programs in business, ministry, and the liberal arts. The Braniff Graduate School of Liberal Arts is particularly notable, offering doctoral programs in philosophy, literature, and politics that attract students from across the country.
UD's English and philosophy departments have long been regarded as among the best in Catholic higher education. The university has been home to distinguished scholars and writers who have shaped Catholic intellectual life in America.
Texas Roots, Universal Mission
Though deeply rooted in Texas—with all the warmth, hospitality, and independence that implies—the University of Dallas has always had a universal vision. The Rome Program alone ensures that every student's horizons extend far beyond the Lone Star State. And UD's commitment to the Western intellectual tradition means its education is ordered toward truths that transcend time and place.
In an era when many Catholic universities have diluted their identity in pursuit of prestige or relevance, UD has held firm. Its Catholic character is not an afterthought or a marketing angle—it is the animating principle of everything the university does.
Why This Matters
When you support University of Dallas, you are investing in:
- A Core curriculum that gives every student a shared foundation in the greatest texts and ideas of Western civilization
- The Rome Program, one of the most distinctive and formative study-abroad experiences in Catholic higher education
- Vocational discernment in an environment where young people are encouraged to ask what God is calling them to do with their lives
- Catholic intellectual culture that takes both faith and reason seriously, without sacrificing one for the other
- Nearly 70 years of proven results forming Catholic leaders, scholars, and professionals
How You Can Support
- Visit their website at udallas.edu to explore undergraduate and graduate programs.
- Recommend UD to high school students and families looking for a genuinely Catholic university with academic rigor and a transformative Rome experience.
- Engage with their alumni network if you're a graduate—UD's strength lies in the bonds between its alumni.
- Consider a gift to the university, particularly to scholarship funds that make this education accessible to more Catholic families.
- Follow UD on social media to see the Rome Program in action and stay connected to the university's mission.
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University of Dallas
- Address: 1845 E. Northgate Drive, Irving, Texas 75062
- Website: udallas.edu
- Phone: (972) 721-5000
- Facebook: University of Dallas
- Instagram: @universitydallas
- Twitter/X: @UDallas
- DCB Listing: Find University of Dallas on Discover Catholic Business