The College of William and Mary (also known as William Mary or W M) is a public university located in Williamsburg, Virginia, United States. It is the second-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is one of the original eight institutions known as Public Ivies. It is also considered a Southern Ivy.

William Mary was founded in 1693 by a Royal Charter issued by King William III and Queen Mary II, joint sovereigns of England, Scotland and Ireland. The school hosted the seat of government of the Colony of Virginia beginning in 1698 as a new capitol building was constructed nearby. In modern times, the College s landmark Wren Building stands at at the western head of Duke of Gloucester Street opposite the reconstructed Capitol of Colonial Williamsburg.

William Mary educated U.S. Presidents Thomas Jferson, James Monroe, and John Tyler and other key figures important to the development of the nation, including U.S. Supreme Court Chi Justice John Marshall, Speaker of the House Henry Clay, and 16 signers of the Declaration of Independence. U.S. President George Washington received his surveyor s certificate there and noted legal scholar George Wythe was both an early student and, later, the first head of W M s law school.

W M is notable in higher education for the founding of the Phi Beta Kappa academic honor society, and the first to have intalled an honor code of conduct for students.

While it became a university in 1779 (it is among several institutions claiming to be the first university in the United States), the school retains the traditional College in its name as was specified in its Royal Charter of 1693. The institution s official name is The College of William and Mary in Virginia.

一、Academics

1、History and milestones

William Mary is the second-oldest institution of higher learning in the United States, established in 1693 (Harvard is the oldest).

1、James Monroe, 5th President of US, W M alumnus

The College was the first to teach Political Economy; Adam Smith s Wealth of Nations was a required textbook.[31] In the rorm of 1779, William Mary became the first college in America to become a university, establishing faculties of law and medicine; it was also the first college to establish a chair of modern languages. Chemistry was taught beginning in the nineteenth century; alumnus and future Massachusetts Institute of Technology founder William Barton Rogers served as the College s Professor of Natural Philosophy and Chemistry from 1828-1835.

Beginning with his 1778 Bill for the More General Diffusion of Knowledge, alumnus and future University of Virginia founder Thomas Jferson was involved with forts to secularize and rorm the College s curriculum. Jferson guided the College to adopt the nation s first elective system of study and to introduce the first student-adjudicated Honor System.

Also at Jferson s behest, the College appointed his friend and mentor George Wythe as the first Professor of Law in America in 1779. John Marshall, who would later go on to become Chi Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, was one of Wythe s students. The College s Marshall-Wythe School of Law is the oldest law school in the United States.

William Mary has produced five Rhodes Scholars since 1988 and many students have won Fulbright, Truman, and Goldwater fellowships.

William Mary has increased its international presence as a global university, offering exchange programs with 15 foreign foreign schools, drawing more than 12% of its undergraduates into these programs, and receiving U.S. state department grants to further expand its foreign exchange programs. Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeline Albright has called W M International Studies Department perhaps the finest in the nation.

2、Graduate placement

W M students have exceptionally high medical and law school acceptance rates hovering around 80% for both medical school and law school. In comparison, graduates of fellow Public Ivys University of Michigan and University of Virginia experience approximately 55% and 65% acceptance rates to medical school, respectively. [6] [7] Another Public Ivy -- UC-Berkeley -- has had an approximately 80% acceptance rate to law school for its graduates which is similar to that of W M, but UC-Berkeley has only an approximately 63% acceptance rate to medical school .

Overall, sixty percent of W M students go on to graduate school within five years of graduation.

3、Rankings

For the past several years, William and Mary has ranked as the best small public university in the nation by U.S. News and World Report.[34] And among America s public four-year, degree-granting institutions, William Mary is ranked 2nd for its high graduation rate. In the August 2007 US News rankings, it is currently ranked 33rd among all national universities (it has generally ranked in the mid 20 s to very low 30 s). In the last U.S. News ranking of quality undergraduate teaching, William and Mary was ranked first among public universities and 3rd overall behind Brown and Dartmouth.

Thomas Jferson, 3rd President of the United States, W M alumnus

In 2006, The Washington Monthly ranking, a survey which counterbalances the U.S. News rankings with a different methodology and intent (e.g., measuring the institution as an engine of service, research, and upward mobility), ranked the College 19th among U.S. universities.

In 2007, The Mason School of Business at The College of William Mary was ranked in the top 10 undergraduate programs among public universities.

William and Mary s Marshall-Wythe School of Law placed 31st in U.S. News s law school rankings.[39] and doctoral program in American colonial history 2nd . In 2007, Business Week ranked the College s undergraduate business program 29th in the nation. Similarly, in 2006, the Public Accounting Report ranked the undergraduate accounting program 23rd and the graduate accounting program 24th. In 2007, a survey completed by more than 1,000 U.S. and Canadian faculty members in international relations, identified William and Mary as one of the top twenty-five colleges or universities for an undergraduate student interested in international relations. William and Mary was one of only five schools without an international relations doctoral program to place in the top 25.

With respect to cost of attendance, William and Mary ranked 3rd best value among America s colleges in the latest 2007 issue of Kiplinger s Personal Finance Magazine.

According to a 2006 survey by the NCAA, William and Mary athletes were ranked 5th for graduation rates (tied with Stanford University). Of the six sports that are individually highlighted in the NCAA report, William and Mary shows a 100 percent graduation rate in three of the sports categories (football, women s basketball and women s track and field/cross county).

In summer 2005, Newsweek Magazine dubbed the College the hottest small state school based on the school s small enrollment (for a public university) and 34 percent increase in applicants since 1999。

4、Learning environment

The State Council of Higher Education for Virginia, a state organization charged with promoting Virginia s institutions of higher education, concluded:

William Mary is one of the nation s premier public universities, combining the best features of an undergraduate college with those of a research university.

William Mary s small university environment, with only 5,635 undergraduates enrolled, distinguishes it from larger research universities, and its 11:1 student-to-faculty is lower than all top public universities. 86% percent of undergraduate classes have fewer than 40 students.[33] Many applicants indicate that they were drawn to W M s small-college environment.

5、Graduate programs

William Mary also enrolls approximately 2,000 students in the following graduate or professional schools:

William Mary Law School (Marshall-Wythe)

Mason School of Business

Graduate School of Arts and Sciences

The Thomas Jferson Program in Public Policy

School of Education

Virginia Institute of Marine Science

6、Admissions and selectivity

Nationally, W M s acceptance rate (32%) places it among the more selective universities in the U.S. (more selective than peer institutions University of Virginia and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill according to the most recent U.S. News survey)[47] For the Class of 2007-2008 academic year, 33% of William and Mary s 10,845 applicants were offered admission.[48] Of those admitted to the Class of 2011, 39% are expected to matriculate.Traditionally, more than 80% of matriculants graduate from the top 10% of their high school class and approximately 95% of those who enter W M return their second year.

It is reported that Gateway W M has helped ensure a record number of first-generation college students in the school s history by allowing those with lower incomes to attend the university for free. In fact, a record number of international students and first-generation college students are part of the Class of 2011. [49]

The top five overlap schools for William Mary applicants are Cornell University, Duke University, Georgetown University, the University of Virginia, and Vanderbilt University.

二、Student life

1、Campus activities

The College enjoys a temperate climate[51]. In addition to renovations on the student recreation center, (including a new gym, rock climbing wall, and larger exercise rooms)[52] the largely wooded campus has its own lake and outdoor amphitheatre. Beaches at Virginia Beach are an hour away, and Washington DC is a two and a half hour drive to the north.

The College s University Center Activities Board (UCAB) hosts concerts, comedians, and speakers on campus and in the 8,600-capacity Kaplan Arena.[53] The campus boasts an award-winning student newspaper called The Flat Hat, as well as a student-produced online newspaper and monthly print magazine called The DoG Street Journal.

2、Honor system

William Mary s Honor System was first established by alumnus Thomas Jferson in 1779 and is widely believed to be the nation s first. [10] During the orientation week, nearly every entering student recites the Honor Pledge in the Great Hall of the Wren Building pledging:

As a Member of the William Mary community I pledge, on my Honor, not to lie, cheat, or steal in either my academic or personal life. I understand that such acts violate the Honor Code and undermine the community of trust of which we are all stewards.

The Honor System stands as one of the College s most important traditions; it remains student-administered through the Honor Council with the advice of the faculty and administration of the College. The College s Honor System is codified such that students found guilty of cheating, stealing or lying are subject to sanctions ranging anywhere from an oral warning up to expulsion.

3、Traditions

William Mary has a number of traditions, including the Yule Log Ceremony, at which the president dresses as Santa Claus and reads a rendition of How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the Vice-President of Student Affairs reads Twas the Night Bore Finals, and The Gentlemen of the College sing the song The Twelve Days of Christmas .Incoming freshmen participate in Opening Convocation, at which they pass through the entrance of the Wren Building and are officially welcomed as the newest members of the College. Freshmen also have the opportunity, during orientation week, to serenade the President of the College at his home with the Alma Mater song. The Senior Walk is similar, in that graduating seniors walk through the Wren Building in their departure from the College. On the last day of classes, Seniors are invited to ring the bell in the cupola of the Wren Building.

Unofficial traditions include the Triathlon, a set of three tasks to be completed by each student prior to graduation. These include jumping the wall of the Governor s Palace in Colonial Williamsburg after hours, and if so inclined, running through the Boxwood Maze to the Palace itself, streaking through the Sunken Gardens, and swimming in the Crim Dell (pictured).

Legends include: kissing a date on the Crim Dell Bridge results in a future marriage. The crypt under the chapel can be reached via steam ducts under the campus and were supposedly used to steal bones from the grave of Norborne Berkeley, 4th Baron Botetourt who is entombed in the Wren Chapel. Many ghosts supposedly[citation needed] haunt the older sections of this school.

4、Fraternities and sororities

William Mary has a long history of fraternities and sororities dating back to Phi Beta Kappa, the first Greek-letter organization, which was founded there in 1776 . Today, Greek organizations play an important role in the College community, along with other social organizations (e.g. theatre and club sports organizations). Overall, about one-third of its undergraduates are active members of the following 14 national fraternities and 12 sororities. William Mary is also home to several unique non-Greek social fraternities, notably the Nu Kappa Epsilon music sorority[58] and the Queens Guard.

5、A cappella

William and Mary has eleven collegiate a cappella groups, including two Christian a cappella groups.

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