Our students are more impressive every year.
William & Mary remains in high demand. Undergraduate applications topped 12,000 last year - for the first time ever - a 70 percent increase over the past decade. Graduate applications also increased. The nation's oldest law school had its most applicants ever. Almost 5,000 people applied for admission to the J.D. Class of 2012, over 24 applicants for each available seat. VIMS saw a 16 percent increase in graduate applications, while Education jumped 17 percent, Arts & Sciences increased 14 percent, and full-time business MBA applications rose almost 9 percent.
Our new students came with sterling credentials. Among the 1,395 freshmen in the Class of 2013, nearly 80 percent finished in the top 10 percent of their high school class, with a median SAT score of 1350. Twenty-five percent are students of color, and our international students increased. The largest cohort of new professional and graduate students was the Law School's J.D. Class of 2012, 213 strong. Their median undergraduate GPA is 3.66 and their median LSAT score 165 (92nd percentile).
Student activity on campus and in the community has never been higher. We have more than 400 student organizations, many of them focused on service. Most of our students participate in service projects in Williamsburg, throughout Virginia, and around the world. According to the most recent survey, William & Mary students devote more than 320,000 hours each year to helping others. Currently, 46 undergraduate alumni and two graduate alumni are serving with the Peace Corps. Thirty-six members of the Class of 2009 joined Teach for America.
Strong bodies as well as strong minds predominate on campus. More than 500 students compete on our 23 Division I teams. They finished last year with three league championships, raising William & Mary's all-time total to 95 in the Colonial Athletic League (more than any other school in the conference), and 197 Tribe athletes earned All-Conference honors. Three W&M players were drafted by professional teams last year.
Our varsity athletes are students in fact, not just rhetoric. Over the past 11 years, 46 of them have been elected to Phi Beta Kappa. Four of W&M's five Rhodes Scholars played on varsity teams. Our varsity athletes graduate at a similar rate as our overall student body and well above the rates for varsity players at other schools such as UVA, Virginia Tech, Richmond, and Chapel Hill.
Beyond varsity sports we have 45 club teams (with 1,500 players) and nearly 600 intramural teams (with over 3,000 participants). Our new recreation center was open more than 4,500 hours last year and received nearly 162,000 visits. All told, about 80 percent of William & Mary students play on teams or work out. This is not a sedentary place.
