George Mason University - What's it like?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure why I come on here to find useful information. The folks posting on the College threads are such smug, judgmental dicks. Can't have a thread without someone putting a school, or those who choose it, down.

Don't leave out sentencing your kids to a lifetime of minimum wage work if they are B students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Like any college, it is what you make it. I grew up in Arlington and went to Mason. I lived on campus for 2 years and then got a townhouse within walking distance with friends. It was no different than being anywhere else. I joined a sorority, went to frat parties, was a tour guide, was in the dance company, on a club sport team, and I loved it.

An introvert can struggle on any college campus as easily as an extrovert can thrive on any college campus. GMU has everything any other large college does except for football tailgates. Students don’t really come together over the sports like they do at big 10 or SEC schools.

This! GMU was a great experience for our DD who lived in the dorms all four years. GMU has an xlnt computer science program (off the top of my head the best known are: engineering; animation; serious game design; economics and computer science, but it is huge so there is something for everyone. She had no interest in greek but made friends in her major and dorm. All of her friends lived on campus except one whose parents leased a townhouse near campus (it can be expensive). There are a lot of graduate students on campus, as well. It is getting more difficult to get in, year by year. I know several Nova families who were disappointed. 75th percentile for enrolled students last year had a 3.9; the median was a 3.7, and the bottom 25th percentile had a 3.4. ACT was 30 at 75th percentile, which is where you need to be if applying from Nova. Check out the Honors program if you qualify. It provides distinct perks. One of the nice things about GMU is that the Commonwealth keeps pumping money into it to grow so DD's dorms were like hotel rooms. The computer department was state of the art. The downside is that she experienced never-ending construction while she was there.

Baloney. Mason accepted 84 percent of FCPS applicants last year and 86 percent of Arlington applicants. No way these kids all had a 30 on the ACT!

Apparently you are new at this. This is SCHEV. State Council of Higher Education. Here is the link to GMU with the 30 mentioned at the 75th percentile. My DC had a 32. You should also know that the percentage of acceptances in Virginia are inflated due to the fact that the public high school counselors (paid by the state and have a reputation to consider with these institutions) guides the Virginia students to the most appropriate Virginia school. They will not be encouraging if you have a B+ student. They will not file a satisfactory letter of recommendation (and yes they do write one). And they certainly will not sign off on the most rigorous box. It is their job to match public high school students with the best public universities if that is the route the parents choose.

Insert any private or public four year institution and you can see last year's incoming stats of students who actually arrived. It is a very useful tool for parents in Virginia. https://research.schev.edu/enrollment/B10_FreshmenProfile.asp

Ah, SCHEV poster. How we've missed you.

Any Virginia parent that doesn't use SCHEV is a fool. All the counselors use it. It covers public AND private four year institutions. I am not aware of any other state that offers as much free transparent information as Virginia.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure why I come on here to find useful information. The folks posting on the College threads are such smug, judgmental dicks. Can't have a thread without someone putting a school, or those who choose it, down.

Don't leave out sentencing your kids to a lifetime of minimum wage work if they are B students.

Not like they are here! College Confidential tends to be helpful parents and students. I especially like that students post after they get in, are deferred or rejected what they stats, ECs, and other factors that came into play might have been. You can cull a lot of information from that site on a particular school in no time. Most students, though, have moved to sub-Reddits when discussing schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Like any college, it is what you make it. I grew up in Arlington and went to Mason. I lived on campus for 2 years and then got a townhouse within walking distance with friends. It was no different than being anywhere else. I joined a sorority, went to frat parties, was a tour guide, was in the dance company, on a club sport team, and I loved it.

An introvert can struggle on any college campus as easily as an extrovert can thrive on any college campus. GMU has everything any other large college does except for football tailgates. Students don’t really come together over the sports like they do at big 10 or SEC schools.

This! GMU was a great experience for our DD who lived in the dorms all four years. GMU has an xlnt computer science program (off the top of my head the best known are: engineering; animation; serious game design; economics and computer science, but it is huge so there is something for everyone. She had no interest in greek but made friends in her major and dorm. All of her friends lived on campus except one whose parents leased a townhouse near campus (it can be expensive). There are a lot of graduate students on campus, as well. It is getting more difficult to get in, year by year. I know several Nova families who were disappointed. 75th percentile for enrolled students last year had a 3.9; the median was a 3.7, and the bottom 25th percentile had a 3.4. ACT was 30 at 75th percentile, which is where you need to be if applying from Nova. Check out the Honors program if you qualify. It provides distinct perks. One of the nice things about GMU is that the Commonwealth keeps pumping money into it to grow so DD's dorms were like hotel rooms. The computer department was state of the art. The downside is that she experienced never-ending construction while she was there.

Baloney. Mason accepted 84 percent of FCPS applicants last year and 86 percent of Arlington applicants. No way these kids all had a 30 on the ACT!

Fine, believe what you want. But the 75th percentile for entering students last year was a 30. Period. I know quite a few disappointed families who didn't get in. All Virginia and NOVA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Like any college, it is what you make it. I grew up in Arlington and went to Mason. I lived on campus for 2 years and then got a townhouse within walking distance with friends. It was no different than being anywhere else. I joined a sorority, went to frat parties, was a tour guide, was in the dance company, on a club sport team, and I loved it.

An introvert can struggle on any college campus as easily as an extrovert can thrive on any college campus. GMU has everything any other large college does except for football tailgates. Students don’t really come together over the sports like they do at big 10 or SEC schools.

This! GMU was a great experience for our DD who lived in the dorms all four years. GMU has an xlnt computer science program (off the top of my head the best known are: engineering; animation; serious game design; economics and computer science, but it is huge so there is something for everyone. She had no interest in greek but made friends in her major and dorm. All of her friends lived on campus except one whose parents leased a townhouse near campus (it can be expensive). There are a lot of graduate students on campus, as well. It is getting more difficult to get in, year by year. I know several Nova families who were disappointed. 75th percentile for enrolled students last year had a 3.9; the median was a 3.7, and the bottom 25th percentile had a 3.4. ACT was 30 at 75th percentile, which is where you need to be if applying from Nova. Check out the Honors program if you qualify. It provides distinct perks. One of the nice things about GMU is that the Commonwealth keeps pumping money into it to grow so DD's dorms were like hotel rooms. The computer department was state of the art. The downside is that she experienced never-ending construction while she was there.

Baloney. Mason accepted 84 percent of FCPS applicants last year and 86 percent of Arlington applicants. No way these kids all had a 30 on the ACT!

Fine, believe what you want. But the 75th percentile for entering students last year was a 30. Period. I know quite a few disappointed families who didn't get in. All Virginia and NOVA.

Dude, you're the one pushing SCHEV. It shows that 85 percent from NOVA got in, and that 2/3 of the student body is from NOVA! So you can't know that many rejects.

[Anonymous]

Neighbor went and loved it - CS kid. I know several adjunct professors - GMU gets very high quality adjuncts from DC area - can make for good job connections.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Like any college, it is what you make it. I grew up in Arlington and went to Mason. I lived on campus for 2 years and then got a townhouse within walking distance with friends. It was no different than being anywhere else. I joined a sorority, went to frat parties, was a tour guide, was in the dance company, on a club sport team, and I loved it.

An introvert can struggle on any college campus as easily as an extrovert can thrive on any college campus. GMU has everything any other large college does except for football tailgates. Students don’t really come together over the sports like they do at big 10 or SEC schools.

This! GMU was a great experience for our DD who lived in the dorms all four years. GMU has an xlnt computer science program (off the top of my head the best known are: engineering; animation; serious game design; economics and computer science, but it is huge so there is something for everyone. She had no interest in greek but made friends in her major and dorm. All of her friends lived on campus except one whose parents leased a townhouse near campus (it can be expensive). There are a lot of graduate students on campus, as well. It is getting more difficult to get in, year by year. I know several Nova families who were disappointed. 75th percentile for enrolled students last year had a 3.9; the median was a 3.7, and the bottom 25th percentile had a 3.4. ACT was 30 at 75th percentile, which is where you need to be if applying from Nova. Check out the Honors program if you qualify. It provides distinct perks. One of the nice things about GMU is that the Commonwealth keeps pumping money into it to grow so DD's dorms were like hotel rooms. The computer department was state of the art. The downside is that she experienced never-ending construction while she was there.

Baloney. Mason accepted 84 percent of FCPS applicants last year and 86 percent of Arlington applicants. No way these kids all had a 30 on the ACT!

Fine, believe what you want. But the 75th percentile for entering students last year was a 30. Period. I know quite a few disappointed families who didn't get in. All Virginia and NOVA.

Dude, you're the one pushing SCHEV. It shows that 85 percent from NOVA got in, and that 2/3 of the student body is from NOVA! So you can't know that many rejects.

And it is considered "selective" by USN&WR. Why is that? As explained above, the public high school counselors are the gatekeepers into the Virginia public institutions. They counsel parents and students away from schools where an application would be wasted and towards those publics where they have a shot. They provide the ranking information. They write the letter of recommendation. They are the ones who check off how rigorous your child's curriculum is. The same happens in other states with public schools, which is why Berkeley's selectivity is a high 16%. If it were not a public serving California, it would be lower.

Here is the "selective" comments by USN&WR>

GMU Admissions
George Mason University admissions is selective with an acceptance rate of 87% and an early acceptance rate of 92%. Half the applicants admitted to GMU have an SAT score between 1110 and 1320 or an ACT score of 24 and 30. However, one quarter of admitted applicants achieved scores above these ranges and one quarter scored below these ranges.

So bash away but yes, I know NOVA families and students who really want to go there and were not accepted. Quite a few as it happens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Like any college, it is what you make it. I grew up in Arlington and went to Mason. I lived on campus for 2 years and then got a townhouse within walking distance with friends. It was no different than being anywhere else. I joined a sorority, went to frat parties, was a tour guide, was in the dance company, on a club sport team, and I loved it.

An introvert can struggle on any college campus as easily as an extrovert can thrive on any college campus. GMU has everything any other large college does except for football tailgates. Students don’t really come together over the sports like they do at big 10 or SEC schools.

This! GMU was a great experience for our DD who lived in the dorms all four years. GMU has an xlnt computer science program (off the top of my head the best known are: engineering; animation; serious game design; economics and computer science, but it is huge so there is something for everyone. She had no interest in greek but made friends in her major and dorm. All of her friends lived on campus except one whose parents leased a townhouse near campus (it can be expensive). There are a lot of graduate students on campus, as well. It is getting more difficult to get in, year by year. I know several Nova families who were disappointed. 75th percentile for enrolled students last year had a 3.9; the median was a 3.7, and the bottom 25th percentile had a 3.4. ACT was 30 at 75th percentile, which is where you need to be if applying from Nova. Check out the Honors program if you qualify. It provides distinct perks. One of the nice things about GMU is that the Commonwealth keeps pumping money into it to grow so DD's dorms were like hotel rooms. The computer department was state of the art. The downside is that she experienced never-ending construction while she was there.

Baloney. Mason accepted 84 percent of FCPS applicants last year and 86 percent of Arlington applicants. No way these kids all had a 30 on the ACT!

Fine, believe what you want. But the 75th percentile for entering students last year was a 30. Period. I know quite a few disappointed families who didn't get in. All Virginia and NOVA.

Dude, you're the one pushing SCHEV. It shows that 85 percent from NOVA got in, and that 2/3 of the student body is from NOVA! So you can't know that many rejects.

Dude, have you ever even looked at SCHEV, what it offers, the people behind it? It's astonishing how much information you can get from it. Read and learn. https://www.schev.edu/

[Anonymous]

I'm a GMU graduate and really enjoyed it. Like others I joined a sorority and was very active on campus. I think if someone is saying the campus is boring they aren't putting the effort in to do things. RA's, especially freshmen RAs, work very hard to make fun events for the students to go to so they can meet people.

I also loved how we were constantly going into the city to go to museums or other things as part of class assignments. I feel I got a solid education there and had no issue finding a job right out of college. I am now in hiring and would not hesitate to hire another GMU grad.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure why I come on here to find useful information. The folks posting on the College threads are such smug, judgmental dicks. Can't have a thread without someone putting a school, or those who choose it, down.

Yep. I have to remember that the usual a-holes who do this aren’t representative of most normal people in the real world. Thankfully.

[Anonymous]

We are from non-DCUM Virginia, and DD was in the Honors College at GMU. She was happy overall, and I tried to remember what she enjoyed/complained about below.

Positives:
-Dorms were newer and very nice
Honors College: curriculum compacts gen ed requirements (resulting in more room to play with schedule/double major/minor), provides a smaller community, confers priority registration, advisors were good
-Access to DC for internships throughout the school year (critical for her major)
-Diversity
-Greek life is there if you want it but not a big deal if you don’t want to be involved — DD wasn’t interested but friends who were didn’t seem consumed by it

Negatives
-Food wasn’t great, but mitigated once moving to a suite with a kitchen
-Only one shopping center walkable from campus otherwise need to take shuttle or have a car (parking is $$)
-Long commute for the internships mentioned as a positive (she agrees worth it in the end because other admissions she considered seriously were GW and AU, but GMU was so much less expensive)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Neighbor went and loved it - CS kid. I know several adjunct professors - GMU gets very high quality adjuncts from DC area - can make for good job connections.

GMU's CS program is xlnt. Check out also animation and game design. The newest and most highly sought out major (for jobs placement) is GMU's cyber-security program.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are from non-DCUM Virginia, and DD was in the Honors College at GMU. She was happy overall, and I tried to remember what she enjoyed/complained about below.

Positives:
-Dorms were newer and very nice
Honors College: curriculum compacts gen ed requirements (resulting in more room to play with schedule/double major/minor), provides a smaller community, confers priority registration, advisors were good
-Access to DC for internships throughout the school year (critical for her major)
-Diversity
-Greek life is there if you want it but not a big deal if you don’t want to be involved — DD wasn’t interested but friends who were didn’t seem consumed by it

Negatives
-Food wasn’t great, but mitigated once moving to a suite with a kitchen
-Only one shopping center walkable from campus otherwise need to take shuttle or have a car (parking is $$)
-Long commute for the internships mentioned as a positive (she agrees worth it in the end because other admissions she considered seriously were GW and AU, but GMU was so much less expensive)

DS was a Serious Game Design major so got an internship at the VSGI headquarters at GMU's Science and Technology campus in Manassas campus. He took the shuttle bus to and from the main campus. https://vsgi.gmu.edu/. He has been employed full-time by Bethesda Softworks for two years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm not sure why I come on here to find useful information. The folks posting on the College threads are such smug, judgmental dicks. Can't have a thread without someone putting a school, or those who choose it, down.

Yep. I have to remember that the usual a-holes who do this aren’t representative of most normal people in the real world. Thankfully.

There are MUCH fewer "smug, judgmental dicks" on College Confidential. I've found most people to be helpful and responsive. perhaps that's because everyone selects a moniker so it isn't 100% anonymous.

[Anonymous]

DS is in his 2nd year at GMU after TJ. He turned down Canergie Mellon and attended GMU to save money. He already has a job at Amazon technology division. He will have over 200K in the bank after graduation for not attending CMU. He said classes at GMU are much easier than TJ.