Student News

In response to COVID-19, a group of George Mason University students had planned to create 3D printed personal protective equipment (PPE), such as face shields and masks for health care professionals and their patients. When the announcement came on March 22 that Mason campuses were closing, they knew they had to move fast.

American ginseng has been nicknamed “green gold” for good reason. The root that grows wild across the Appalachian Mountains can fetch more than $500 per pound and has been used medicinally for generations to support everything from brain function to the immune system.

For 21 straight nights, graduating senior Yasser Aburdene spent his evenings protesting in front of the Bolivian Embassy in Washington, D.C., fighting for democracy in the midst of a controversial election victory by Evo Morales. He had no idea his advocacy would land him in the spotlight at one of the most historic sites for human rights.

Six students at George Mason University’s Antonin Scalia Law School are participating in the school’s new Immigration Litigation Clinic and advocating for clients facing a range of complex immigration proceedings.

Dilafruz Khonikboyeva and her family won the Green Card Lottery while living through Tajikistan’s civil war, but they didn’t know about it until the years-long blockade was lifted in 1995. They crossed multiple battle lines to reach the U.S. consulate in Moscow. Luckily, even though their green cards had expired by the time they arrived, the U.S. government honored them, Khonikboyeva said.

How do you combat an overabundance of algae? Create a floating biological island. That’s what freshman Kennedy Ream did after attending the Washington Youth Summit on the Environment (WYSE) hosted by George Mason University, the National Geographic Society and the Smithsonian’s National Zoo as a high schooler in 2018.

What began as a vacation to the United States became a permanent stay for Amini Bonane and her family when war broke out in their home country of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

There are multiple sides to every story. But when it comes to Eritrea, a country that’s been isolated due to 20 years of war and nine years of sanctions, much of their story hasn’t been told, said Carol Pineau, a former CNN journalist who reported live on the Eritrean-Ethiopian war and is a visiting scholar at George Mason University.

When Amanda Jarvis was a child and her school in rural Oklahoma lost its arts funding, it was an immediate disappointment, she said. But it also had ripple consequences.

School suspensions can triple the probability that a student will drop out of school or have later involvement with the criminal justice system, according to studies linked to the school-to-prison pipeline. These statistics are concerning, but Sarah Parshall has hope.

For about 25 years, Khairi Shammo said it felt like he and his family from Sinjar, Iraq, were “running from a conflict to a conflict.” They moved back and forth from Iraq to Syria multiple times trying to avoid the Iraq-Iranian war, terrorism and religious discrimination for being Yazidis, members of a religious minority.

Mason alumnus Joey Meyer developed an appreciation for using his imagination to build ever since he was a child fascinated by Legos. After graduating from McLean High School in Virginia, he still wanted to create, and earning an engineering degree was his goal.