The world can feel chaotic today for Catholic school leaders - there are policy shifts, enrollment challenges, school choice initiatives, and artificial intelligence consuming our work and attention. Now. Here. This. provides a spiritual and mental reset - how do I stay present to the person in front of me now? How do I find God in the midst of my worries and fears? The podcast will provide insight, wisdom and grace from Catholic school leaders who are celebrating and struggling through the same joys and challenges you face each day. Learn from them and be inspired by them so you can be more present to your community. Because Now. Here. This. is how we lead for transformation. New episodes every Tuesday!
To learn more and contribute to the conversation visit: https://ace.nd.edu/programs/mary-ann-remick-leadership-program/now-here-this (https://ace.nd.edu/programs/mary-ann-remick-leadership-program/now-here-this)
Hear Dr. Brandi Odom Lucas, administrator with the Archdiocese of Los Angeles's Department of Catholic Schools, in conversation with Notre Dame's Kevin Baxter about guiding school communities and how leadership's challenges are thankfully bound to God's promise of presence amid uncertainty.
Odom Lucas offers her perspective on the unique expectations of women who lead and the power of Catholic social teaching to shape welcoming schools that honor the dignity of every child. "Catholic social teaching has everything we need in order to create the loving, caring environments that we're called to create as Catholic educators," she said. "I think the Catholic school leader has to be very unapologetic about how our faith will inform our practices and our procedures and our policies."
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3 Nov 2026
Fr. Steve Katsourous: Innovation in Catholic Schools
Educator, author, and innovator Father Steve Katsouros joins Notre Dame's Kevin Baxter to discuss how leaders build new pathways to opportunity for the communities they serve by reimagining solutions to old challenges. The founding dean and executive director of Arrupe College at Loyola University Chicago, a groundbreaking, two-year higher education opportunity for first-gen students, talks about his faith and leadership journey through communities and schools across the country, his ongoing work with like-minded innovators at Homeboy Industries, and the genesis of the title for his book, Come to Believe: How the Jesuits are Reinventing Education Again.
"Jesuits are probably not good managers. We're also not good maintainers," Katsouros conceded, adding what they are: "We're innovators. We have a vision, and that usually impels us to go forward."
Contribute to the conversation. Click here (https://docs.google.com/forms/d/15EwBIMbt2dASvS_dFRS397DetxhhgVbUsutXUeaZd7Y/edit?ts=6aa981d2) to share the name of a guest you would like to hear from on a future episode.
27 Oct 2026
Lauren Casella: Forming Leaders Grounded in Faith
Notre Dame's Kevin Baxter hosts Dr. Lauren Casella, director of the Catholic School Leadership Academy at Loyola Marymount University, for a conversation about the joys and challenges of forming faith-filled school leaders. Casella shared observations about the call for Catholic school leaders to continue growing in faith as part of their professional lives, and the gift students offer as accidental spiritual directors. "I will say a lot of students—and Kevin, this is probably true for you, too—a lot of students challenge me to pray in different ways, to have different devotionals, to learn different ways of seeing scripture and art," Casella said. "That's something I think we can emphasize more."
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20 Oct 2026
Pete Bevacqua: Managing Change in an Age of Disruption: Lessons for Leaders
In this all-Notre Dame episode of the podcast, hear University Vice President and James E. Rohr Director of Athletics Pete Bevacqua '93 in conversation with friend Kevin Baxter about leading successful teams through times of disruption. Bevacqua discusses his professional journey back to campus to lead Notre Dame's sports programs, life lessons from his mother, and what sustains him in work with coaches and student-athletes amid the hailstorm of changes to college athletics.
"What I'm proud of...is that in this moment of chaos, we are still attracting kids from all over the country—and quite frankly all over the world,—who want to come here and win, but they [also] want to get this Notre Dame education and be part of this Notre Dame experience."
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13 Oct 2026
Erika Wikstrom: Pearls of Wisdom for Catholic School Leaders
Secretary for Education and Superintendent of Catholic Schools in the Diocese of Orlando, Erika Wikstrom, discusses how creativity and change management are indispensable tools for leaders in times of uncertainty. In a conversation about her leadership journey with Notre Dame’s Kevin Baxter, Wikstrom shares her early understanding of leadership as the act of bringing people together, running as a spiritual discipline, and the impact she hopes to have as a Black woman leader in the church.
“I'm walking into these Catholic schools, so hopefully they see that the world can have its perceptions, and people can have their ideas and comments, but at the end of the day, Kevin, if you're comfortable in your own skin and your own identity, that's not going to shake you.”
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6 Oct 2026
Greg Richmond: A Superintendent Exit Interview - Wisdom From a Leadership Journey
Former Chicago Catholic school superintendent Greg Richmond spoke with Notre Dame's Kevin Baxter about leadership as service, and how the approach supports larger mission goals through committed engagement with principals. A week before the end of his tenure as head of schools for the Archdiocese of Chicago (https://schools.archchicago.org/), Greg spoke with Kevin about the district's new shared goal of building upon welcome to create belonging for students ("We believe belonging fosters student wellness" (https://schools.archchicago.org/about-us/why-catholic-schools)), and the enduring love for the schools he's led—and served—for five years."
They're not there for the money," Richmond says of the nearly 150 Catholic schools managed by the archdiocese. "They're there because they care about the kids, they care about the mission, [and] they care about fully developing children academically, socially, emotionally and spiritually."
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29 Sept 2026
Ann Garrido: Redeeming Leadership
Author, speaker, and scholar Ann Garrido talks with Notre Dame's Kevin Baxter about her leadership journey and the enduring relevance of her three-book 'Redeeming' series for Catholic school educators building culture and navigating conflict. Hear Ann share how writing also served as a way to access mentorship during her professional development as a school administrator; the new challenge in contemporary society of resolving conflict when even facts can no longer agreed upon; and reconciling the complicated nature of power with the Catholic imperative to use it well. "We will tend not to see ourselves as having power because we don't want to be associated with that.; it's considered often with abuse or oppression," Garrido says. "But power from a Christian lens has the potential to be good. And if one does have power and one does not use it, well, that's where you get in the greatest danger."
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22 Sept 2026
Welcome to Now. Here. This. with Kevin Baxter
In this podcast opener, Host Kevin Baxter, director of the Mary Ann Remick Leadership Program at Notre Dame, introduces a series to offer a spiritual and mental reset for those transforming Catholic schools today.
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