George Mason University

George Mason University, public, coeducational institution in Fairfax, Virginia, 25 km (16 mi) west of Washington, D.C. The school began in 1957 as a branch of the University of Virginia, offering two-year programs in engineering and the liberal arts. In 1958 the branch campus received the name George Mason College in honor of George Mason, the Virginia planter and politician who wrote the Virginia Declaration of Rights in 1776 and helped draft the Constitution of the United States in 1787.

The Virginia legislature established the school as a four-year institution in 1966 and added graduate-level programs in 1970. George Mason became independent from the University of Virginia in 1972, while remaining part of Virginia’s system of colleges and universities. The school grew rapidly after severing its ties to the University of Virginia. In 1972 George Mason University had about 4000 students. By 1995 enrollment exceeded 24,000. Adopting an entrepreneurial, business-oriented management philosophy, George Mason has emphasized efficiency in the services it offers students and the Northern Virginia community. To reduce costs and maximize efficiency, the university relies on business enterprises to manage many of its operations, including the campus food service and the bookstore.

George Mason University confers bachelor’s, master’s, professional, and doctoral degrees in the arts and sciences, business administration, education, information technology and engineering, law, and the health sciences. The school’s main campus covers 274 hectares (677 acres). The university operates a second campus in Arlington, Virginia, that houses a law school and international institute. James Buchanan, a professor at George Mason, won the 1986 Nobel Prize in economics.