A Campus for Innovative Learning

“The Washington Center is all about partnerships,” says Roxane O. Adler Hickey, M.Ed. ’02, Ed.D. ’23, assistant provost for leadership & academic engagement. “We partner with campus programs and faculty, as well as alumni and employers in Washington, D.C., to best serve our students.”

The Washington Center is a key part of William & Mary’s national preeminence, providing a location in the capital for students and alumni to gather and learn with direct access to all D.C. has to offer.

Since it opened in 2001, the Washington Center has continued to grow. Over the past five years, the center has acquired around 3,500 square feet of space, added six new programs and more than doubled the number of scholarships it offers. It hosts more than 450 undergraduate students each year for internship-bearing programs over a semester, summer or winter break. Learn more about the Washington Center at wm.edu/dc.

At the center’s 20th anniversary celebration in 2021, W&M President Katherine Rowe spoke about its vital role in the life of the university: “The Washington Center exemplifies William & Mary’s vision to transcend boundaries — connecting classrooms with work experiences, current students with alumni and connecting W&M with the capital in a deep way, where more than 20,000 of our community live and work,” Rowe said.

Room to Spread Out

The Washington Center is conveniently located in the Mount Vernon Triangle neighborhood of D.C. and easily accessible by Metro. Starting in 2026, the Washington Center will expand by 3,500 square feet filling most of the floor of the D.C. Bar headquarters. This new space will allow for more classrooms, events and alumni-focused experiences.

Staff at the center also collaborate with faculty on the W&M main campus to host events, such as the Year of the Environment celebration in December 2025 in partnership with the Batten School of Coastal & Marine Sciences & VIMS and the Institute of Integrative Conservation. Adler Hickey is chair of William & Mary’s Year of Civic Leadership in 2026, which coincides with the nation’s 250th commemoration, and the Center will host or partner in associated events throughout the year.

Once a week, alumni can receive career counseling and resources from Michael Steelman, director of alumni career development & professional engagement, either at the center or virtually. This partnership with the Office of Career Development & Professional Engagement is one of the many ways the center collaborates with the main campus.

While this new space will allow for more student populations to study at the center, it is designed with alumni in mind. They will be able to host meetings, connect with students and fellow alumni, host their own organization events and retreats and more. “Alumni are always excited and never say no to being part of our programs. While they’re doing so much for our students, we want to make sure that they feel like the Washington Center is their home, their campus in the city,” says Adler Hickey.

In addition to being an educational hub for current students and alumni, the Washington Center is considered “an embassy of William & Mary,” says Gabe Cancio-Bello ’20, M.Ed. ’24, the Washington Center’s director of marketing & communications. Families that live in the D.C., Maryland and Northern Virginia (DMV) area come to the center to learn about W&M without traveling to Williamsburg, and they feel welcomed as they would on campus.

“There are no strangers,” he says. “It’s small and intimate enough that anyone who comes here is going to meet someone from the team who can answer all their questions.”

Continuing Education

The Washington Center started as a study-away option with internship programs has become a year-round campus supporting undergraduate and graduate students, alumni and working professionals. Faculty and staff at the Washington Center work closely with William & Mary’s various schools to give students and alumni additional opportunities for learning and making career connections.

Adler Hickey and Erin Battle ’13, M.Ed. ’15, the senior associate director, met with W&M’s deans to hear what they could be doing to better serve alumni and reach the larger university community. With their feedback and collaboration, Adler Hickey and Battle created three programs in partnership with their related schools to meet the needs of continuing education:

• The Teacher Pathways Program — Partnering with the School of Education, this master’s degree program is for teachers working in D.C. charter schools (with additional schools to follow).
• The Nonprofit Management Program — Partnering with the Raymond A. Mason School of Business, this “4+1” program allows undergraduate students to get their bachelor’s and master’s degrees in five years.
• The Cybersecurity Master’s Degree — Partnering with the business and law schools and the College of Arts & Sciences, this stand-alone degree will develop students’ expertise in tackling digital threats.

In addition to the graduate degree programs, the center also offers a leadership certificate. This virtual class is held asynchronously, so mid-senior-level leaders can complete it on their own time. Hundreds of people have gone through this program since it began, including alumni, faculty and staff.

Global Scholars Program

“We saw a lot of students who felt like they had to choose between doing research with Global Research Institute (GRI), studying in D.C. and going abroad,” says Battle. To answer this need, the Global Scholars Program (GSP) was created in 2022 as a partnership between the Washington Center, GRI and the Reves Center for International Studies.

Over the course of one year, participants grouped in two cohorts split their time between an integrative policy and research course, an immersive Washington Center experience, a study abroad trip and a summer internship either in Washington, D.C. or abroad.

One cohort is themed around global policy and foreign affairs, traveling to Brussels and Paris, aimed at students who want to explore the different fields within those industries. The second covers American statecraft, going to India. A previous cohort (held only from 2024-25) was based around finance and economics, going to China.

“The first class of GSP students were such troopers. In the first meeting we told them, ‘Tell us what’s working and what’s not … know that we’re experimenting here and we’re all in this together and they really embraced that. We were able to craft a program that met the students’ needs based on students’ feedback,” says Battle.

Now, the GSP has grown exponentially with around 20 students per cohort per year.

Get Verified

In June of 2025, the Washington Center launched Verified, a week-long, bootcamp-style, non-credit bearing program with three tracks allowing around 20 students each to gain real-world insight into industries such as consulting, legal studies and journalism and the media. Participants gain hands-on experience, receive advice on the industry and build connections with alumni and professionals in their track’s field.

“Verified was created to fill a gap. Alumni and employers were coming to us and saying, ‘students might be able to write in an academic sense, but they’re not yet trained for my sector,’” Battle says.

Since Verified isn’t credit bearing, it’s led by alumni and practitioners providing students sector-specific knowledge. Verifiedparticipants work on a project or written piece similar to what they would create in the real world, such as an amicus brief for legal studies and creating simulations for consulting.

“Verified gives students concrete experience in a specific sector,” Battle says. “Students are learning what they would need to know how to do on day one of their employment.”

Yet Much Stays the Same

Every student who studies at the Washington Center has a personalized experience. Adler Hickey says, “We spend a lot of time and intentionality building a culture where people can contribute and work as a team,” she says. “The W&M values of respecting one another and being free to be who you are makes them feel heard and supported on an individual basis.” 

To help make it possible for additional students  to attend the Washington Center, they have more than doubled the number of scholarships given out. Over $150,000 was awarded in 2022-23, and 100% of the scholarships go to students who have demonstrated need.

William & Mary students continue to impress future employers through their internship experiences. “Their supervisors will remember and they’ll reach out to us and say, ‘We need a William & Mary student in our office,’” says Cancio-Bello. For twenty years straight, the Washington Center has secured an internship for every single student since the start of its internship programs.

“Students are coming out of our programs career-ready because they are able to build connections with practitioners,” says Adler Hickey.

The Washington Center continues to expand William & Mary’s undergraduate and graduate programs, connecting the W&M community with industry professionals and providing support long after graduation.

“What I like to tell my students is that we’re rooting for you already,” says Cancio-Bello. “You join the program, you get a professional experience with a mentor and then you’re part of the D.C. community forever.”