What’s wrong with William & Mary?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:The gender imbalance is not surprising for a LAC, which is what it is closer to than anything else. Virginia Tech, on the other hand, has a 57% male undergrad population

Perhaps that's a factor, but there are simply more qualified female applicants than male applicants these days and more women are choosing to go to college. Only VMI and Virginia Tech are majority male. The rest of the Virginia public colleges and universities are majority female. Overall the Virginia higher ed system was 56% female for 2018 enrolled class and the U.S. was 57%. Here are the percentage of females at Virginia schools for fall 2018 new enrolled students:

Longwood 69%
MWU 66%
Norfolk State 65%
VCU 64%
Radford 64%
JMU 59%
W&M 59%
UVA 57%
United States 57%
State of Virginia 56%
CNU 56%
ODU 53%
UVA - Wise 53%
GMU 50%
Virginia Tech 45%
VMI 17%

Interesting. women seem to dig these schools. But maybe not George Mason so much. Shocker.

Both GMU and Va Tech have lower attraction rates because their strongest fields are research (GMU is the no. 1 research university in VA), engineering (xlnt at both), STEM, cyber security (GMU), game design (GMU), computer science (both), architecture (Va Tech), animal husbandry (Va Tech), math, etc. A lot of female students want the liberal arts SLAC experience which is not Va Tech or GMU

Based on what measure is GMU #1 in Virginia? For 2017, GMU was 146 in R&D expenditure, VT was 46, UVA was 51, VCU was 97 according to NSF data. Research per se is not a factor anyway. UNC Chapel Hill was 11 in R&D yet is over 60% female. Engineering does tend to have a higher percentage of males.

I said top tier for research in VA. Right here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mason_University. And also if you google George Mason and research you will learn this: Mason, rated a top-tier (R1) research university by the Carnegie Classifications of Institutions of Higher Education,

No, you said "GMU is the no. 1 research university in VA", not "top tier for research in VA".

UVA, VT, VCU, and GMU are R1 classifications. Of the 4, GMU has the lowest level of research, which isn't surprising given it doesn't have a medical school. ODU and W&M are R2 classifications.

W&M only has a tiny handful of grad programs, but this ends up putting it in the "research university" category in this system rather than "national liberal arts colleges".

To be classified as R1 by Carnegie, significant research activity much occur. Simply offering graduate programs does not guarantee this.

That wasn't my point. I'm saying W&M is educationally a lot more like a "national liberal arts college" than a research university, but they are classified as the latter because they have a small handful of graduate programs.

William and Mary is hard to classify. It used to call itself the best small public research university in the country. I think that’s still the case.

I think the "hard to classify" is an issue for William & Mary, but I'm not sure what they can do about it. US News just has two relevant categories: National Universities and National Universities. William & Mary is more or less between the two, but it is of course included in National Universities because of its Carnegie classification. It is too big and has too many programs and research for a National University. (William & Mary does about $60M in research a year vs $5M at Williams College.) But against the National Universities, William & Mary is typically much smaller than the top public universities. It is closer in size to schools like Brown and Princeton. William & Mary doesn't have a medical school, which brings in a lot of research money that helps with the resource inputs in US News (even though they don't really have much to do with undergraduate education). I think this is one of the reasons William & Mary considered merging with Eastern Virginia Medical College a few years ago. In the end, they decided it didn't make sense. I'm sure if Eastern Virginia brought in more research like UVA Health or MCV, they would have gone ahead.

What??

Agree. PP is confused by the USN&WR rankings. William & Mary is no. 40 tied for national universities BUT also no 5 for BEST UNDERGRADUATE TEACHING. Also by USN&WR. There's absolutely noothing "wrong with W&M". It's an xlnt Virginia school and I'd be thrilled if my kids went there. This ranking nonsense means so little.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:The gender imbalance is not surprising for a LAC, which is what it is closer to than anything else. Virginia Tech, on the other hand, has a 57% male undergrad population

Perhaps that's a factor, but there are simply more qualified female applicants than male applicants these days and more women are choosing to go to college. Only VMI and Virginia Tech are majority male. The rest of the Virginia public colleges and universities are majority female. Overall the Virginia higher ed system was 56% female for 2018 enrolled class and the U.S. was 57%. Here are the percentage of females at Virginia schools for fall 2018 new enrolled students:

Longwood 69%
MWU 66%
Norfolk State 65%
VCU 64%
Radford 64%
JMU 59%
W&M 59%
UVA 57%
United States 57%
State of Virginia 56%
CNU 56%
ODU 53%
UVA - Wise 53%
GMU 50%
Virginia Tech 45%
VMI 17%

Interesting. women seem to dig these schools. But maybe not George Mason so much. Shocker.

Both GMU and Va Tech have lower attraction rates because their strongest fields are research (GMU is the no. 1 research university in VA), engineering (xlnt at both), STEM, cyber security (GMU), game design (GMU), computer science (both), architecture (Va Tech), animal husbandry (Va Tech), math, etc. A lot of female students want the liberal arts SLAC experience which is not Va Tech or GMU

Based on what measure is GMU #1 in Virginia? For 2017, GMU was 146 in R&D expenditure, VT was 46, UVA was 51, VCU was 97 according to NSF data. Research per se is not a factor anyway. UNC Chapel Hill was 11 in R&D yet is over 60% female. Engineering does tend to have a higher percentage of males.

I said top tier for research in VA. Right here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mason_University. And also if you google George Mason and research you will learn this: Mason, rated a top-tier (R1) research university by the Carnegie Classifications of Institutions of Higher Education,

No, you said "GMU is the no. 1 research university in VA", not "top tier for research in VA".

UVA, VT, VCU, and GMU are R1 classifications. Of the 4, GMU has the lowest level of research, which isn't surprising given it doesn't have a medical school. ODU and W&M are R2 classifications.

W&M only has a tiny handful of grad programs, but this ends up putting it in the "research university" category in this system rather than "national liberal arts colleges".

To be classified as R1 by Carnegie, significant research activity much occur. Simply offering graduate programs does not guarantee this.

That wasn't my point. I'm saying W&M is educationally a lot more like a "national liberal arts college" than a research university, but they are classified as the latter because they have a small handful of graduate programs.

William and Mary is hard to classify. It used to call itself the best small public research university in the country. I think that’s still the case.

I think the "hard to classify" is an issue for William & Mary, but I'm not sure what they can do about it. US News just has two relevant categories: National Universities and National Universities. William & Mary is more or less between the two, but it is of course included in National Universities because of its Carnegie classification. It is too big and has too many programs and research for a National University. (William & Mary does about $60M in research a year vs $5M at Williams College.) But against the National Universities, William & Mary is typically much smaller than the top public universities. It is closer in size to schools like Brown and Princeton. William & Mary doesn't have a medical school, which brings in a lot of research money that helps with the resource inputs in US News (even though they don't really have much to do with undergraduate education). I think this is one of the reasons William & Mary considered merging with Eastern Virginia Medical College a few years ago. In the end, they decided it didn't make sense. I'm sure if Eastern Virginia brought in more research like UVA Health or MCV, they would have gone ahead.

What??

Agree. PP is confused by the USN&WR rankings. William & Mary is no. 40 tied for national universities BUT also no 5 for BEST UNDERGRADUATE TEACHING. Also by USN&WR. There's absolutely noothing "wrong with W&M". It's an xlnt Virginia school and I'd be thrilled if my kids went there. This ranking nonsense means so little.

My point was simply that William & Mary doesn't fit cleanly into the National University ranking, and it probably hurts the school some in that ranking. I agree there are a lot of good things about William & Mary like the #5 USNWR undergraduate teaching ranking you cite. It is also #13 in Undergraduate Research/Creative Projects and #20 in Senior capstone.

[Anonymous]

Fantastic school. $40K for instate tuition is too high.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Fantastic school. $40K for instate tuition is too high.

In-state tuition and fees for W&M is $23,600.

[Anonymous]

PP meant cost of attendance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:PP meant cost of attendance.

Still a great deal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think OP is on some sort of mission to bash William and Mary. I see similar posts in other threads.

Agree.

[Anonymous]

To be fair, the school is very close to finishing its billion dollar fundraising campaign. I really hope that a lot of that goes to academic scholarships.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Fantastic school. $40K for instate tuition is too high.

That includes everything, Tuition, fees, room, board, books and travel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To be fair, the school is very close to finishing its billion dollar fundraising campaign. I really hope that a lot of that goes to academic scholarships.

1 billion should give them about 20 mil for need-based aid. In state, they could be 100% meet needs, and meet needs OOS for some students.

[Anonymous]

FWIW we visited W&M recently with DS. I was very impressed with the students we talked with, they really seem to love the school and while, yes, it's more expensive than other state schools they seem to put that $ into academics and are reportedly generous in giving undergrads funding for research and study abroad. DS said it would be on his application list but if he got in would need some more exploration to see if it's the right fit.

They really need to recruit more male students to work in admissions -- every single student we interacted with from students on a STEM panel, students available to chat with us while waiting for an information session, those who did the info session and the tour guides were all women. It definitely limited DS's ability to see himself there. We briefly chatted with some male students at a coffee shop but the overall impression from admissions was a female-centered school (even though their male/female balance is similar to the US average).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:FWIW we visited W&M recently with DS. I was very impressed with the students we talked with, they really seem to love the school and while, yes, it's more expensive than other state schools they seem to put that $ into academics and are reportedly generous in giving undergrads funding for research and study abroad. DS said it would be on his application list but if he got in would need some more exploration to see if it's the right fit.

They really need to recruit more male students to work in admissions -- every single student we interacted with from students on a STEM panel, students available to chat with us while waiting for an information session, those who did the info session and the tour guides were all women. It definitely limited DS's ability to see himself there. We briefly chatted with some male students at a coffee shop but the overall impression from admissions was a female-centered school (even though their male/female balance is similar to the US average).

That is indeed a concern, in terms of optics and other matters. The current president, who seems to be doing well enough, cane from Smith.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:FWIW we visited W&M recently with DS. I was very impressed with the students we talked with, they really seem to love the school and while, yes, it's more expensive than other state schools they seem to put that $ into academics and are reportedly generous in giving undergrads funding for research and study abroad. DS said it would be on his application list but if he got in would need some more exploration to see if it's the right fit.

They really need to recruit more male students to work in admissions -- every single student we interacted with from students on a STEM panel, students available to chat with us while waiting for an information session, those who did the info session and the tour guides were all women. It definitely limited DS's ability to see himself there. We briefly chatted with some male students at a coffee shop but the overall impression from admissions was a female-centered school (even though their male/female balance is similar to the US average).

That is indeed a concern, in terms of optics and other matters. The current president, who seems to be doing well enough, cane from Smith.

^ came

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fantastic school. $40K for instate tuition is too high.

That includes everything, Tuition, fees, room, board, books and travel.

PP here - still too high. UMD tuition, fees, room + board is ~ $25K

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Fantastic school. $40K for instate tuition is too high.

That includes everything, Tuition, fees, room, board, books and travel.

PP here - still too high. UMD tuition, fees, room + board is ~ $25K

W&M isn't competing with UMD for students. Not a problem.