The Batten School is one of six graduate units at William & Mary (W&M). As the second oldest university in the nation, W&M is known as both a “Public Ivy” and a leading research university. The Batten School is also an integral part of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (VIMS), which is in Gloucester Point, only 16 miles from the W&M campus in Williamsburg.
VIMS was founded as the Virginia Fisheries Laboratory in 1940 through the efforts of Dr. Donald W. Davis, then chair of the Biology Department at W&M. The Laboratory was named the Virginia Institute of Marine Science and became an independent institution by an Act of Virginia’s General Assembly in 1962. VIMS returned to the administrative umbrella of W&M in 1979.
Since then, VIMS has served as the research partner of W&M’s graduate School of Marine Science – renamed the Batten School of Coastal & Marine Sciences in 2024 – which evolved from a Master’s program in Aquatic Science that began at W&M in 1940 and granted its first Ph.D. degree in 1968.
Today, VIMS is one of the largest marine science and research education centers in the United States, leading in coastal and estuarine science. Its three-part mission – interdisciplinary research, education, and advisory service – offers students a dynamic environment to engage science in service to society. More than 1,000 Batten School & VIMS alumni have gone on to successful careers in academia, government, and the private sector.
The Batten School & VIMS offer three advanced degree programs in marine science, a professional master’s degree (M.A.), a thesis-based master’s degree (M.S.) and a doctoral degree (Ph.D.). All offer options for disciplinary and interdisciplinary studies. Students entering without a M.S. are offered a M.S. bypass option. The Batten School & VIMS also offers two subconcentrations, in marine policy or shellfish aquaculture. Interested students also have a wealth of opportunities to participate in areas of applied research and advisory service to government and other organizations.
The Batten School & VIMS offers an undergraduate bachelor’s degree or an undergraduate minor in Coastal & Marine Sciences. The minor is jointly offered and administered by the Batten School & VIMS and W&M’s College of Arts & Sciences. More information on the undergraduate program is available at https://www.vims.edu/academics/wm_undergrad/.
