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Mason alum Leonard "Len" Bennett’s generous gift of $1 million will create the “Warren D. Decker Professorship Endowment” to support Mason's Debate Team.

On April 8, Mason Debate Team alums and university colleagues honored Professor Warren Decker for his 48 years of coaching and mentoring.

In 2006, Robert DeNiro and Matt Damon came to 911����’s Center for the Arts to promote their film “The Good Shepherd” in a special taping of MSNBC's Hardball with Chris Matthews.

Mason researcher Jenefir Isbister was awarded the university's first patent on August 27, 1996, for her invention of a test for microbial contamination.

Mason’s Army Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (ROTC), known as “The Patriot Battalion,” began in 1982 and frequently conducts training with other universities throughout the District of Columbia, Maryland, and Virginia.

Mason alumni John Whalan, Elaine "Chipper" Petersen, and Bob Veenstra built the university's first telescope and observatory with $200 in start-up funds from the Physics Department.

The largest graduating class of any Virginia public university this year, Mason's Class of 2022 had the distinction of graduating as part of the university’s 50th anniversary celebration.

Did you know that up until the 2004 Commencement 911���� graduation gowns were black? The university moved to green gowns in 2004, thanks to the work of a Traditions Committee.

On April 7, 2022, 911���� celebrated its 50th anniversary as an independent public university. That day and the week of events surrounding it illuminated Mason as a university that is altogether different.

On May 21, 1983, 911���� awarded its first doctoral degree, a doctor of arts in education, to Carolyn Kreiter-Foronda, a teacher at nearby West Springfield High School.