Hey, does Notre Dame consider race in admissions? For example, would being African-American give you a bit of an edge over a white person
Look at section C of the common data set. Race is “considered” but is not “important” or “very important” https://www3.nd.edu/~instres/CDS/2016-2017/CDS_2016-2017.pdf (FWIW you can do the same thing for any college).
On the Notre Dame Admissions Statistics page, the admissions office publishes that 26% of the incoming class is “US Students of Color.” Notre Dame has a less racially diverse student body than many of its peers (such as Vandy, Rice, Wash U, Emory, etc.), so I would expect that being an under represented minority would be a good thing for an ND applicant.
Being a URM (under-represented minority) is considered a “hook”, which is a type of advantage in applicant pools, similar to what a recruited-athlete or a legacy would have (although I don’t know the relative advantages of the 3).
I agree with Geronimoalpaca that Notre Dame is probably looking to increase it’s current level of diversity, which is low relative to it’s peer schools, so that should be helpful for you
ND has publicly stated that it wishes to further diversify its entering class, although in doing so it has spoken mainly in socioeconomic terms. That said, the number of people of color at ND is lower than at many other highly selective universities and members of the Brothers of Holy Cross (who ‘administer’ ND) have expressed concern about this. As ND sees itself as a leading Roman Catholic university, it has stated that admitting more minority and low income students was an integral part of its mission and in keeping with the Church’s historic commitment to the poor.