Lila Mangino, a double major in Sociology and Spanish with a minor in Constitutional Studies, will be attending Notre Dame Law School in the fall.
Mangino has been recognized with a full tuition scholarship, the NDLS Fr. Michael McCafferty Award. This prestigious award recognizes only one or two incoming students whose record of servant leadership reflects the ideals of Notre Dame’s community. Fr. McCafferty was a noted teacher, scholar, and leader in the Notre Dame Law School community who left a lasting impact on the Law School including the introduction of the original chapel and mass services. He was beloved by his students, some of whom sit on the Scholarship Committee and reviewed Lila’s application materials for the award. The committee recognized Lila’s potential to be the kind of leader that Fr. McCafferty was. We congratulate her on this important accomplishment and wish her all the best as she sets about to achieve even more during her years at the ND Law School and beyond.
Throughout her time at Notre Dame, Lila combined scholarship and service. She began her Spanish major at Notre Dame with Introduction to Hispanic Literature and Cultures in the fall of her freshman year and continued in the spring with Once Upon A Time: Children’s Literature and Community Connections where as part of her coursework she helped mentor a group of kindergartners. In the summer after freshman year, Lila was selected to be part of a Nanovic-sponsored summer trip to Andalucía, Spain. There, she both expanded and deepened her appreciation for the complex identities of communities within larger societies and the richness they can bring. That experience sparked her interest to study in Toledo at the Fundación Ortega y Gasset for her semester abroad; while there volunteered as an English teacher at a local school, San Lucas y María. She also spent three weeks in July 2023 at the Notre Dame Rome Global Gateway Rome, Italy to complete an immersive course on theology and Catholic peacebuilding with funding from the Nanovic Institute.
Extensive service and leadership: some highlights include her work with Campus Ministry’s Faith + Justice Leadership Council; three years as her residence hall retreat and service commissioner; two years in leadership with Catholic Relief Services Student Ambassadors Chapter of Notre Dame that involved, among other projects, support of the Afghan Refugee Resettlement Panel; three years with Student Government as a cabinet member of the Department of Diversity and Inclusion, First Generation Low Income Division; working with the Student Policy Network - Monterrosa Immigration Law Project in fall 2022; participating in College Mentors for Kids 2022-2023 where she mentored students from St. Adalbert Catholic School.
Research and scholarship: Lila completed original research on the clergy sexual abuse scandal resulting in a final project “The Catholic Church Sexual Abuse Scandal: Is there hope for the Church in the U.S.?”. She also has completed multiple internships and work as a research assistant for law firms and prosecutors, and faculty. Honors she has received include consistent inclusion in Notre Dame Dean’s List, admission to Alpha Kappa Delta - International Honor Society of Sociology, being a Hesburgh Democracy Fellow, a Menard Family Tocqueville Fellow Fall 2024.