vaparentoffour

My daughter is excited about Mason (wants to major in nursing). We are taking her around VA next week to revisit all the schools that accepted her before sending in a deposit. Mason is her first choice, but her only concern is that it is too close to home. She is worried there won't be enough of a social life in the dorms, etc. She wants the residential college experience, but her priority is a good nursing program. Any on-campus students who can give insight about whether she can be happy on campus? Do the dorms empty out on weekends? Her expectations are simple -- just good friends to hang out with, going to movies, etc. I'm just hoping to avoid a situation where she will be asking to transfer in a year or two.

IamWandering

what is your daughter's experience so far? did she go to GMU and is she living on campus? my d is looking at the school but I'm wondering about the on campus life during the weekends.

HulkHogan

It really depends on what you mean by "campus life" on weekends. George Mason University is not known for partying alot. What do I mean by this? They lack off-campus housing where the majority of renters are college students. The students there tend to be either academic students who are brilliant or your typical B/B+ students who wanted to go to a good school in the state because they didn't get accepted into UVA or Virginia Tech(big flagship schools). According to my brother who is a senior there(transferred from NYU), the school as of right now has alittle over 5,000 students with another 600 beds that are going to be finished by this spring 2010. Another 1,200 beds is going to be finished by spring 2012. So that's around 6,800 beds. There's bound to lifelong friendships being made.

My brother likes the college because it is located near DC, yet has the calm environment of a suburb. There's alot of opportunities to intern also.