Why hasn't GMU surpassed UVA, W&M, VT?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s a commuter school with an ugly campus.

UVA is a thing of beauty created by a founding father.

Didn't take long for the dopey UVA booster to show up.

[Anonymous]

It is not a campus. If you want to go to school in DC, go to school in DC. Otherwise, go to a school with a campus.

Also, it is rapidly selling its soul to MAGA. No thanks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is not a campus. If you want to go to school in DC, go to school in DC. Otherwise, go to a school with a campus.

Also, it is rapidly selling its soul to MAGA. No thanks.

It sounds like you haven’t been to GMU in the past 25 years. GMU has a nice campus with modern buildings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is not a campus. If you want to go to school in DC, go to school in DC. Otherwise, go to a school with a campus.

Also, it is rapidly selling its soul to MAGA. No thanks.

OMG, just stop. People are allowed to lean conservative without being "MAGA." Grow up.

[Anonymous]

We go to swim meets there. It seems squished into the space it has.

Biggest reason though that it will struggle to reach on par with JMU is that it suffers from being right next door for all the brightest kids in NOVA. People do not want to go to school so super close to home.

[Anonymous]

GMU has already surpassed - its #1 in the most number of students in the State.

Read Malcolm Gladwell - most schools are keeping it exclusive by not allowing more students. He gave his example: U. of Toronto has 70k students and the T10 barely grew. GMU grew and continues to grow for the purposes of education not being exclusive.

And stop calling it a commuter school - look at the rankings in some of its majors; Look at the number of Nobel prizes it won - it's more than the rest of the State combined. It's a world class university for blue collar workers .

[Anonymous]

History is not on its side. UVA, W&M, to a lesser extent VT have always been competitive and have reputations for being selective. Not the case with GMU. Very hard to overcome that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We go to swim meets there. It seems squished into the space it has.

Biggest reason though that it will struggle to reach on par with JMU is that it suffers from being right next door for all the brightest kids in NOVA. People do not want to go to school so super close to home.

US News & World Report Ranks GMU higher than JMU. Just because it’s in our backyard doesn’t make it an inferior school at all. Some kids will want to go to JMU for parties and football and whatnot, but some don’t care about that and prefer proximity to employers.

[Anonymous]

GMU is actually a very nice campus and is quite large. It may be too local for some, but the campus size and architexture is appealing

[Anonymous]

I used to work in that area. It’s very suburban. Very middling. Both Charlottesville and Williamsburg are prettier. Can’t speak to Blacksburg.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s a commuter school. And Trumpy.

It’s definitely not Trumpy. It’s very diverse and just had three students arrested for terrorism.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Look at the number of Nobel prizes it won - it's more than the rest of the State combined. It's a world class university for blue collar workers .

GMU has won zero Nobel prizes. Buchanan won when he was at UVA and years later became GMU professor. Smith received the award while he was at George Mason, but it was for work He had done at Arizona.

[Anonymous]

Prestige. Plain and simple. Look at this forum. The constant Ivy League, T10, T20, etc.

All parents want prestige, but it’s a college education that is most important. That degree. Really, any degree is fine. For most careers, that is all that matters. Where they receive it is rather moot.

I recently went to a presentation and the attorney graduated from Towson pre-law and University of Baltimore School of Law. Not prestigious, but he is doing fabulous and happy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Prestige. Plain and simple. Look at this forum. The constant Ivy League, T10, T20, etc.

All parents want prestige, but it’s a college education that is most important. That degree. Really, any degree is fine. For most careers, that is all that matters. Where they receive it is rather moot.

I recently went to a presentation and the attorney graduated from Towson pre-law and University of Baltimore School of Law. Not prestigious, but he is doing fabulous and happy.

Okay, but by this logic GMU should never “surpass” anyone. At best it is equivalent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Prestige. Plain and simple. Look at this forum. The constant Ivy League, T10, T20, etc.

All parents want prestige, but it’s a college education that is most important. That degree. Really, any degree is fine. For most careers, that is all that matters. Where they receive it is rather moot.

I recently went to a presentation and the attorney graduated from Towson pre-law and University of Baltimore School of Law. Not prestigious, but he is doing fabulous and happy.

Okay, but by this logic GMU should never “surpass” anyone. At best it is equivalent.

Correct. There is not much history of a run of the mill state school overtaking a flagship. I actually can’t think of any examples.