James Madison University

JMU offers an unforgettable university experience for international students, combining the very best of American education and college life. Named after James Madison, the fourth president of the United States, JMU represents the perfect blend of focused learning and true university spirit.The university is situated in the Shenandoah Valley, in Harrisonburg, Virginia, only two hours away from Washington D.C.

Set in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, JMU is a tight-knit community of 22,000 undergraduate and graduate local and international students and 4,000 faculty and staff who come from across the country and around the world. Only two hours from Washington D.C., JMU is fast becoming one of the nation’s leading lights in higher education. That’s because students enjoy unusually engaged relationships with world-class faculty who are at JMU because they want to pursue knowledge and teach talented students.

What does that mean for you and your future as an international student? A 2014 Gallup survey of more than 29,000 college graduates in the U.S. found that having a professor take a personal interest in them while they were a student leads to a higher sense of purpose and well-being. Gallup also found that JMU alumni score far above the national average on every dimension of well-being, and significantly higher than alumni of the Top 100 colleges and universities in the U.S. News & World Report rankings.