The following is from the University document "Vision 2005": The Foundation, Revised, July 4, 1996.

            The University of Dayton is a comprehensive Catholic university, a diverse community committed, in the Marianist tradition, to educating the whole person and to linking learning and scholarship with leadership and service.

A Comprehensive University: Committed to being an educational community which:

• offers a broad range of undergraduate programs and selected graduate and continuing education programs;

• views learning and scholarship as a shared task of discovering, integrating, applying, and communicating knowledge;

• emphasizes learning and scholarship at the intersections--of liberal and professional education, of the disciplines, and of theory and practice.

As a comprehensive university, we commit ourselves to the education of the whole person within a vibrant learning community, to strong programs in both liberal arts and sciences and the professional disciplines, and to collaboration across disciplinary and organizational boundaries. We are responsive to the needs of the wider community.

            A Catholic University: Committed to a Catholic vision of learning and scholarship that includes:

• a common search for truth based on the belief that truth can be more fully known and is ultimately one;

• respect for the dignity of the human person created in the image and likeness of God;

• an appreciation that God is manifested sacramentally through creation and the ordinary things in life.

A Catholic vision of the intellectual life is based ultimately upon the acceptance of the revelation of God in Jesus Christ received through the believing community, the church. This revelation integrates the human and the divine, and requires for understanding both the scholars heart and head.

            In the Marianist Tradition: Committed to a Marianist vision of the educational community that includes:

• a focus on educating the whole person through a community of challenge and support;

• a rich collaboration that recognizes the diverse gifts and talents of all members of the community and brings them together for our common educational mission;

• challenge to be a servant-leader able to connect scholarship and learning with leadership and service.

            The Marianist vision of education emphasizes the creation of a strong educational community. We strive first of all to be a community of learners and scholars that supports the full human development of its members. We also strive to be a community that looks beyond itself by rendering public service. We create an environment in which our members, working in a scholarly manner, are free to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of our own work, the work of others, and the trends in our society. At the same time, we work in partnership with others to improve our human community.