This is part of a monthly series that informs George Mason University's faculty and staff about how the Office of Admissions and its collaborators are working to build and support a diverse student body that reflects our world and future.
The Office of Admissions has seen increases in freshman and transfer applications for Virginia residents and out-of-state and international students for the second year in a row. This freshman cohort has the highest yield of applications from Virginia high school seniors in the university's history.
Mason continues to grow its number of freshman applications across all populations.
Crucially, Mason’s efforts to expand access to a college education has resulted in increased applications from historically underrepresented student populations for the 2024 freshman class. This includes double-digit percentage increases in the number of Black and Hispanic students applying to Mason and a more than 20 percent increase in the number of first-generation applicants.
The diversity of freshman students applying to Mason continues to increase.
Mason’s recruitment efforts have been supported this year by the piloting of two new direct admissions programs. These are an expanded Common Application Direct Admissions Pilot and a new set of High School Direct Admissions (HSDA) partnerships with Virginia schools. The HSDA pilot increased the percentage of students applying from these schools by 30% and, as of March 1, 646 (52%) students in the program had claimed their offer of admission.
At more than 17%, this year marks Mason's highest application yield for the state of Virginia.
Recently, Mason received $1.2 million in funding as part of the state of Virginia’s efforts to enhance the recruitment and retention of Pell-eligible students. The investment will be used to fund positions and programming to support these efforts, including Access to Excellence Seminars that help students and families with college planning, financial literacy, and FAFSA/VASA completion. The first of these seminars was hosted on February 10 and had nearly 100 high school juniors and seniors in attendance.
In the graduate space, Mason has seen an increase in applications from Virginia and the broader United States.