The shield embodies Virginia Tech's motto -- Ut Prosim (That I May Serve) -- by incorporating an image of the university's War Memorial Pylons, where this motto is etched in stone. The shield's shape also reflects the collegiate heritage of all universities, and the numerals "1872" recognize the year the university was founded and reinforce the traditions of more than a century of service to the Commonwealth of Virginia. The shield was adopted in May 1991.
 

Virginia Tech at a glance ...

• Located in Blacksburg, Virginia
• Eight colleges and graduate school
• 60 bachelor's degree programs
• 140 master's and doctoral degree programs
• 25,000+ full-time students
• 16:1 student-faculty ratio
• Main campus includes more than 100 buildings, 2,600 acres, and an airport
• Computing and communications complex for worldwide information access
• Ranked 55th in university research in the United States
• Has adjacent corporate research center

Background

Founded in 1872 as a land-grant college named Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College, Virginia Tech is now a comprehensive, innovative research university with the largest number of degree offerings in Virginia, more than 100 campus buildings, a 2,600-acre main campus, and a 1,700-acre agriculture research farm. The university is located in Montgomery County, 38 miles southwest of Roanoke, in the New River Valley. Through a combination of its three missions of teaching and learning, research and discovery, and outreach and engagement, Virginia Tech continually strives to accomplish the charge of its motto: Ut Prosim (That I May Serve).

Enrollment

26,370 on-campus; 83.2 percent undergraduate students; 16.8 percent graduate students; 58.1 percent male; 41.9 percent female. Total enrollment on and off campus is 28,469.

Admissions

Virginia Tech received 19,046 applications for the fall 2006 freshman class. Approximately 23 percent of the class was filled by early decision candidates. The typical fall 2006 freshman had a high school grade point average of 3.80, with a middle range of 3.54 to 4.01. The average cumulative SAT reasoning test score was 1231, with a middle range of 1130 to 1330.

Full-time Instructional Faculty

1,304; 66.5 percent are tenured (fall 2005).

Alumni

More than 190,000 living alumni from every state and more than 100 countries.

Board of Visitors

A board of visitors, appointed by the governor of Virginia, is composed of 13 members, headed by a rector. Current board of visitors members are Jacob A. Lutz III, Rector; John R. Lawson II, Vice-Rector; Michael Anzilotti; Beverley Dalton; Ben J. Davenport Jr.; Michele L. Duke; Robert L. Freeman Jr.; L. Bruce Holland; Sandra Stiner Lowe; George Nolen; James W. Severt Sr.; James R. Smith; Philip S. Thompson; and Lori L. Wagner. The president of the state Board of Agriculture and Consumer Services serves as an ex-officio member. The presidents of the Faculty Senate and the Staff Senate are also ex-officio, non-voting representatives. Each year, an undergraduate student and a graduate student are selected through a competitive review process to serve as non-voting representatives to the board.

Instruction

The university offers bachelor's degree programs through its seven undergraduate academic colleges: Agriculture and Life Sciences, Architecture and Urban Studies, Engineering, Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, Natural Resources, Pamplin College of Business, and Science. On the postgraduate level, the university offers master's and doctoral degree programs through the Graduate School and a professional degree from the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine.
 

Research

The university generated $290 million for research programs in fiscal year 2005. Each year, Virginia Tech receives significant external support for research, instruction, Extension, and public service projects. In the most recent fiscal year (2005-06), the university received 2,122 awards to conduct research. Support for these projects originates from an ever-expanding base of sponsors. Today, nearly 775 sponsors fund more than 3,500 active projects. Researchers pursue new discoveries in agriculture, biotechnology, information and communication technology, transportation, energy management (including leadership in fuel-cell technology and power electronics), and a wide range of other engineering, scientific, social science, and creative fields. This research led to 87 disclosures, 17 patents, and 20 licenses in calendar year 2005. The Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center offers opportunities for businesses to establish close working relationships with the university and nurtures entrepreneurs with new inventions and developments. Located on 120 acres adjacent to the main campus, the center consists of 21 buildings housing more than 130 companies with approximately 1,900 employees.

Special Academic Programs

In our Cooperative Education Program, students can alternate semesters of study with semesters of professional work during their sophomore and junior years. The University Honors Program helps qualified students expand their intellectual powers through special sections of regular classes, seminars, and independent study. The Study Abroad Program consists of academic programs, tours, and independent travel, conducted in conjunction with overseas universities and institutions. Students enrolled in the corps of cadets are eligible for the Army, Air Force, and Navy ROTC programs.

Outreach and International Affairs

Outreach and International Affairs, which spearheads the university's outreach mission, encompasses a number of university-wide programs. They include the Center for European Studies and Architecture; Commonwealth Campus Centers in Southwest Virginia, Hampton Roads, Richmond, and Roanoke; the Office of Economic Development; the Office of International Research, Education, and Development, including Education Abroad and applied research programs in developing countries; Outreach Fellows; Southside Outreach Programs, including the Institute for Advanced Learning and Research in Danville and Reynolds Homestead in Patrick County; and Outreach Program Development, including the Center for Organizational and Technological Advancement, Continuing and Professional Education, English Language Institute, The Hotel Roanoke & Conference Center, Outreach Program Services, Service-Learning Center, The Inn at Virginia Tech & Skelton Conference Center, and Upward Bound/Talent Search.

Off-campus Facilities

Virginia Tech has a number of facilities located across the commonwealth and one facility in Europe. These include the Marion duPont Scott Equine Medical Center in Leesburg; several locations in the Virginia Tech National Capital Region; Hampton Roads Center in Virginia Beach; Virginia Tech Roanoke Center; Virginia Tech Richmond Center; and Virginia Tech Southwest Center in Abingdon. Virginia Tech also owns and maintains the Center for European Studies and Architecture in Riva San Vitale, Switzerland, which is part of the university's study abroad program. Tech owns The Hotel Roanoke & Conference Center for academic programs, continuing education, seminars, and conferences.

University Budget

Virginia Tech's operating budget in 2006-07 is approximately $900 million and is distributed to two divisions: the university division and the Cooperative Extension/Agricultural Experiment Station division. The state appropriates a portion of the funds, and the remainder originates from student tuition and fees, grants and contracts, sales and services, federal sources, user fees, and others.

Athletics

Virginia Tech is a member of the Atlantic Coast Conference. NCAA Division I-A men's varsity sports at Tech are football, basketball, baseball, soccer, indoor and outdoor track, swimming and diving, wrestling, tennis, golf, and cross country. Women's varsity sports are basketball, tennis, volleyball, swimming and diving, indoor and outdoor track, soccer, softball, lacrosse, and cross country. An extensive intramural program offers opportunities for participation in more than 20 recreational activities. The university also participates in intramural sports and club sports programs that allow students to compete against programs from other colleges and universities across the country.

Virginia Tech Foundation

As of June 30, 2006, the Virginia Tech Foundation's assets and managed funds -- including gifts and bequests -- totaled $807.9 million. The total endowment owned and managed by the university was $447.4 million. Endowment value per student was $16,447.

Extension

Virginia Cooperative Extension is a dynamic organization that stimulates positive personal and societal change, leading to more productive lives, families, farms, and forests, as well as a better environment. Extension responds to the needs of individuals, families, groups, and organizations with educational programs in three broad areas: agriculture and natural resources, family and consumer sciences, and 4-H youth development.

Extension, operated jointly in the commonwealth by Virginia Tech and Virginia State University, has been helping people improve their economic, cultural, and social well-being for more than 90 years. And while Extension has a long history of helping make America's agricultural powerhouse more productive and economical, it also does important work in the state's urban and rural areas -- from helping expectant mothers learn healthy nutritional practices to counseling families in financial distress. With 107 city/county offices and tens of thousands of volunteers, Extension's non-formal education benefits more than 1 million participants annually. Extension has touched virtually every life in the state in some way.

Extension is a product of cooperation among local, state, and federal governments in partnership with thousands of citizens who, through local Extension Leadership Councils, help design, implement, and evaluate Cooperative Extension's needs-driven programs.
 

Designed in 1965 by Col. Harry D. Temple (Class of 1934) when he was commanding officer of the Army's Institute of Heraldry, the coat of arms was granted to the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets by the U.S. Army. The symbols are as follows:

• Flaming grenade = preparation for war
• Four gold stars = four major wars in which Tech cadets had fought before 1965 (Spanish-American, World War I, World War II, and Korean)
• Laurel wreath = the presidential citation given to the cadet band for Spanish-American War service
• Color red = strength and courage
• Sword = command

The HokieBird, the university mascot, evolved from a live turkey paraded on the playing field to a hand-sewn costume with a papier-mâché head to today's professionally manufactured outfit (a costumed mascot -- which eventually evolved into HokieBird -- first took the field in the fall of 1962).

In 1913, Floyd Mead, a local resident nicknamed "Hard Times," who was chosen by the student body to serve as the team's mascot, trained a large turkey that he could make gobble on command at games. Fans and sports writers enthusiastically adopted the "Gobbler" nickname and began to use it regularly.

The term "Hokie" was coined by O.M. Stull (Class of 1896) when he wrote the "Old Hokie" spirit yell, first used in the fall of 1896 ("Hoki, Hoki, Hoki, Hy / Tech! Tech! VPI"). Fans started calling Tech teams "Hokies" as well as "Fightin' Gobblers." In the 1980s, a football coach who didn't like the gobbler image encouraged the use of the nickname Hokies, and the two names evolved into the HokieBird.
 

Virginia Tech's Benchmark Institutions

(For the purpose of salary comparisons, the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia identifies institutions whose academic profiles are similar to Virginia Tech's.)

• University of Arizona, Tuscon
• University of California, Berkeley
• Colorado State University, Fort Collins
• University of Colorado, Boulder
• Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.
• University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
• University of Iowa, Iowa City
• Iowa State University, Ames
• University of Maryland, College Park
• Michigan State University, East Lansing
• University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
• University of Missouri, Columbia
• North Carolina State University, Raleigh
• Ohio State University, Columbus
• Pennsylvania State University, University Park
• University of Pittsburgh
• Purdue University, West Lafayette, Ind.
• Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, New Brunswick
• State University of New York, Buffalo
• University of Southern California, Los Angeles
• University of Tennessee, Knoxville
• Texas A&M University, College Station
• University of Texas, Austin
• University of Wisconsin, Madison