Maria Sophia Aguirre is the new president of Catholic Distance University, headquartered in Charlestown, West Virginia. She is the third person to lead the university in its 40-year history.
Founded in 1983 as the Catholic Home Study Institute, today the university offers over 150 total academic and continuing education courses each year entirely online. Enrolled students reside in 49 states and 24 foreign countries. In addition to a wide array of certificate programs, the university offers an associate’s degree in Catholic studies, a bachelor’s degree in theology, and master’s degrees in theology and theology and educational ministry.
After completing accounting and business administration degrees in Argentina, Dr. Aguirre worked in accounting and commodities trading in Chicago for several years. She then returned to the academic world to earn a master’s degree and a Ph.D. in economics with concentrations in monetary and fiscal policies and international financial markets from the University of Notre Dame in Indiana. She has been serving as a tenured professor of economics at the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.
Dr. Aguirre has worked to develop and implement Integral Economic Development (IED), an interdisciplinary approach to economic analysis that recognizes the role of social relationships — first manifested by the family — as key drivers of economic activity. Her research has led to a successful collaboration with a variety of business leaders, academicians, technologists, and policymakers on six continents, improving the lives of people in the developing world.