Washington and Lee University

Washington and Lee University is a private liberal arts university in Lexington, Virginia. It traces its origin to Augusta Academy, founded in 1749, later Liberty Hall Academy. It took George Washington's name after his 1796 gift of James River Canal stock and added Robert E. Lee's after his presidency of the college from 1865 to 1870. Its defining structure is a small undergraduate college plus a professional School of Law rather than a large graduate school of arts and sciences.

The School of Law, opened in 1849, is the principal site of graduate study and offers the J.D. Undergraduate departments span the humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences; there is no medical or engineering school. An undergraduate honor system shapes campus culture and extends in spirit to the law school.

Total enrollment is about 2,200, of whom roughly 360 to 400 are law students. The student body is predominantly American, with a modest international share. Faculty number a few hundred. Alumni include U.S. Supreme Court Justice Lewis F. Powell Jr., novelist Tom Wolfe, and journalist Roger Mudd.

Graduate study for most students means a three-year J.D. with a first-year curriculum, upper-level electives, and clinics, on a semester calendar. Lexington is a small college town in the Shenandoah Valley, next to Virginia Military Institute. Law students work on a walkable historic campus, with internships typically in nearby Virginia courts and firms rather than in a large metropolitan legal market.

In the Grad School Navigator directory, Washington and Lee University lists 1 master's program, in law.