Our History

• Chartered on February 8, 1693, by King William III and Queen Mary II of England
• The second oldest institution of higher learning in America, and the first to become a university
• Severed formal ties with Britain in 1776
• Became state-supported in 1906 and coeducational in 1918
• Phi Beta Kappa, the nation's first academic Greek society, was founded here in 1776
• Find more cool facts about William & Mary

Our Campuses & Locations

Williamsburg (William & Mary main campus)

• 1,200-acres — including the Martha Wren Briggs Amphitheatre, Lake Matoaka and College Woods — located in downtown Williamsburg, Virginia
• 70% of our undergraduate students live here, on-campus, in a typical year
• Sir Christopher Wren Building (1700) is the oldest university building still in use in the U.S.
• Improvements to building efficiency and new LEED certified facilities mean we've expanded campus while reducing our energy use. W&M has also committed to reaching carbon neutrality by 2030.

Gloucester Point (Virginia Institute of Marine Science)

• 42-acre campus at the mouth of the York River, a major tributary and passageway to Chesapeake Bay and the Atlantic Ocean
• Chartered in 1940, VIMS is one of the leading marine research and education centers in the U.S.
• VIMS is both an independent state agency and home to W&M's graduate School of Marine Science
• Two satellite campuses on the Eastern Shore and Rappahannock River
• Positioned across the York River from Yorktown, site of the decisive battle of the Revolutionary War
• Home to the 93-foot research vessel Virginia, the most advanced ship of its kind of the East Coast.

Washington, DC (The Washington Center)

• Runs Study in DC academic opportunities that enable W&M students to live, study and work in Washington, DC
  
• Works with schools, departments and programs across William & Mary to help them navigate the DC-area's dynamic governmental, for-profit and non-profit institutions, and engage with the 17,000+ W&M DC alumni community
• Manages a suite of office, classroom and event space in the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Building, located steps from the Dupont Circle Metro station.
• Provides leased housing that allows Study in DC faculty and students to live in safe, high-quality apartments in Downtown DC

Outstanding, Diverse Students

• From 49 states, DC, Puerto Rico and more than 60 foreign countries
• 6,236 undergraduates and 2,703 graduate students
• 30% identify as students of color
• 77% of freshmen who are ranked graduated in the top 10% of their class
• Middle 50% range for first-year students on SAT: 1300-1490 and on ACT: 30-34
• 80% of undergraduates participate in research mentored by faculty
• 450+ student clubs and organizations
• 3,500+ students participate in community service annually
• Nearly 60% of undergraduate students study abroad during their time at W&M, in more than 50 countries each year.
• Earn doctorates at one of the top rates for any public university in the nation

Professors Who Teach

• 11:1 student-faculty ratio
• 100% of classes taught by faculty
• 87% of our classes have fewer than 40 students — more than half have fewer than 20 students
• 663 full-time faculty members across all undergraduate, graduate and professional programs
• W&M is ranked 4^th in the country for undergraduate teaching by U.S. News & World Report
• W&M has more recipients of the Commonwealth of Virginia's Outstanding Faculty Award than any other college or university

Academics

• Programs in Arts & Sciences and our four graduate/professional schools: Business, Education, Law and Marine Science
• More than 45 undergraduate programs and more than 40 graduate and professional degree programs
• Degrees conferred: B.A., B.A.Ed., B.B.A., B.S., Ed.D., J.D., LL.M., M.A., M.A.C., M.B.A., M.Ed., M.P.P., M.S., M.S.B.A., Ph.D.

Campus Facilities

• Earl Gregg Swem Library houses more than 2 million books, journals, films and e-resources, and its Special Collections Research Center is home to rare books, manuscripts and artifacts.
• Swem Library's Reeder Media Center boasts two innovative classrooms, a screening room, collaboration lab and eight acoustically isolating studios for media recording, production and mastering.
• The Muscarelle Museum of Art has a permanent collection of more than 6,000 paintings, sculptures and works on paper, and serves as a research center for campus.
• The Integrated Science Center (ISC) is a massive collaborative research and teaching facility for applied science, biology, chemistry, computer science, mathematics and psychological sciences undergrads, graduate students and faculty.
• Throughout campus, W&M dining offers access to our two all-you-care-to-eat facilities, five specialty coffee houses, four convenience stores, a bake shop, food court and national franchises. 
• The Raymond A. Mason School of Business is housed in Alan B. Miller Hall which provides 160,000 square feet of state-of-the-art facilities for instruction, student activities, faculty offices, visiting scholars and research.
• The School of Education is in a 112,000-square-foot modern facility bringing together all of the school's programs, classrooms and offices under one (beautiful) roof.
• Learn more about our historic and innovative campus spaces, as well as housing and dining.

Our Alumni

• 104,799 and counting
• Three U.S. presidents — Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe and John Tyler — were educated at William & Mary (four if we include George Washington's surveyor's license).
• Some of our graduates have included head coaches who have led their teams to the Super Bowl and World Cup, Emmy award-winning actors, leaders of both the FBI and CIA, innovators at Hulu, Netflix and Apple, NASA’s chief scientist, a groundbreaking video-game producer, and renowned comedians like Jon Stewart and Patton Oswalt.