弗吉尼亚理工学院暨州立大学｜Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

弗吉尼亚理工学院暨州立大学（英文：Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University，缩写为Virginia Tech或VT），中文简称弗吉尼亚理工大学，位于美国弗吉尼亚州西南部的黑堡（Blacksburg）镇，是一所以工科为主的综合性公立大学。于1872年创建。根据卡内基教育基金会于2005年公布的大学分类，维吉尼亚理工大学被归类为特高研究型大学（very high research activity）。在美国4,383所高等学府中，只有96所获得此项分类。

一、历史

弗吉尼亚理工大学在1872年建立的时候，叫做弗吉尼亚农业和机械学院（Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College），当时政府曾赠与建校用地，在美国为数不多。后于1896年改名为弗吉尼亚农业与机械学院和理工学院（Virginia Agricultural and Mechanical College and Polytechnic Institute）可被简称为Virginia Polytechnic Institute, VPI。而且从这一年开始，校训 Ut Prosim ( That I May Serve )被立下并沿用至今。

二、Academics

Virginia Tech offers 80 bachelor s degree programs and 140 Master s and Doctoral degree programs through the College of Agriculture Life Sciences, the College of Architecture Urban Studies, the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences, the Pamplin College of Business, the College of Engineering, the College of Natural Resources, the College of Science, and the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine. The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences offers the only two-year associate s degree program on campus, in agricultural technology. The ten most popular majors for the incoming class of 2005 were University Studies (Undeclared), General Engineering, Business (Undeclared), Biology, Communication, Psychology, Marketing, Political Science, Animal and Poultry Sciences, and Architecture. Virginia Tech s endowment is known as the Virginia Tech Foundation, and as of 2007 total assets, gifts, and funds equal $524.7 million USD. Virginia Tech s operating budget for the 2007 2008 school year is $967 million.

Virginia Tech ranked 29th among national public universities and 71st among all national universities.Its College of Engineering undergraduate program was ranked 8th among public engineering schools and 14th in the nation among all accredited engineering schools that offer doctorates. Seven different undergraduate programs in the College of Engineering are ranked in the top 20 among peer programs nationally - the industrial engineering program is ranked 9th; engineering science and mechanics, 8th; civil engineering, 11th; environmental engineering, 14th; mechanical engineering, 14th; aerospace engineering, 14th; and electrical engineering, 17th. Its Pamplin College of Business undergraduate program is ranked 24th among the nation s public institutions and 41st overall.The architecture and landscape architecture programs in Virginia Tech s College of Architecture and Urban Studies are ranked among the very best in America. In its 2008 report, DesignIntelligence (the only national college ranking survey focused exclusively on design) ranked the undergraduate architecture and urban/regional studies program 1st nationally among both public and private universities. The graduate architecture program ranked 5th in the nation and 1st among public universities. In its 2007 report, DesignIntelligence ranked the university s undergraduate and graduate interior design programs 7th and 5th respectively.

Programs in the College of Natural Resources consistently rank among the top of their type in the nation. The college s wildlife program is ranked first by its peers, and the fisheries program is ranked second. In a recently published study of the research impact of North American forestry programs, the Journal of Forestry ranked Virginia Tech s programs second on the perceptions-based composite score and third on the citations- and publications-based index.

On January 3, 2007 Virginia Tech along with Carilion Health System announced the creation of a new medical school that will be a joint venture between the two organizations. The first class is scheduled to be admitted in either 2009 or 2010. The new medical school will have approximately 40 students per class, making it a very small medical school. It will be located in Roanoke next to the Carilion Health System hospital.

The Virginia Tech Stability Wind Tunnel, directed by Aerospace and Ocean Engineering Professor William Devenport, is the largest university-owned anechoic wind tunnel in the United States.

三、Rankings

Virginia Tech ranked 29th among national public universities. Among national universities, Virginia Tech ranked 71st. The Virginia Tech College of Engineering undergraduate program was ranked 14th in the nation (tied with Johns Hopkins and Northwestern) among all accredited engineering schools that offer doctorates. It was eighth among engineering schools at public universities. Six Virginia Tech undergraduate engineering specialties ranked among the top 20 of their respective peer programs (aerospace engineering, 14th; civil engineering, 11th; electrical engineering, 17th; engineering science and mechanics, 8th; environmental engineering, 14th; industrial engineering, 9th; and mechanical engineering, 14th).

The Pamplin College of Business undergraduate program is ranked 41st among the nation s undergraduate business programs and 24th among public institutions. Pamplin s overall ranking places it in the top 10 percent of the approximately 460 U.S. undergraduate programs accredited by the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business International.

Virginia Tech was also recognized as having one of the top 14 cooperative education and internship programs in the nation.

Virginia Tech ranks in the top 20 public colleges and universities nationally among colleges that offer a first-class educational experience at a bargain price, according to Kiplinger s Personal Finance magazine.

The architecture and landscape architecture programs in Virginia Tech s College of Architecture and Urban Studies are ranked among the very best in America. In its 2007 report, DesignIntelligence, the only national college ranking survey focused exclusively on design, ranked the undergraduate architecture program fourth nationally and first among public universities. DesignIntelligence also ranked the university s undergraduate interior design program seventh in the nation.

四、Campus

The Virginia Tech campus is located in Blacksburg, Virginia. The central campus is roughly bordered by Prices Fork Road to the northwest, Plantation Drive to the west, Main Street to the east, and US 460 Bypass to the south, though it has several thousand acres beyond the central campus. The university has established branch campuses in Hampton Roads (Virginia Beach), the National Capital Region (Falls Church - Alexandria, Virginia), Richmond, Roanoke, and the Southwest Virginia Higher Education Center in Abingdon.

The Blacksburg campus is arranged rather uniquely in comparison to other universities. In the center of campus lies the Drillfield, which is a large oval field running Northeast to Southwest, encircled by a one way street known as Drillfield Drive. The Drillfield s name stems from its historical use by the Virginia Tech Corps of Cadets to conduct military drills. An underground river underneath the drillfield makes the land unsuitable for building, protecting it as an open space on campus. On the northwestern side of the Drillfield lies the majority of the academic and administrative buildings, including Burruss and McBryde halls. On the southeastern side of the Drillfield lies the majority of the residential buildings, including the residence halls, dining halls, and War Memorial Gym. Newman Library is located on the eastern side of campus and connects to Torgersen Bridge, which spans the main road into campus, Alumni Mall. North of the Drillfield and northwest of Alumni Mall lies the Upper Quad, known to many students as military campus. The Upper Quad is home to the Corps of Cadets barracks and Shultz Dining center.

In 2007, Virginia Tech was ranked #1 by the The Princeton Review under the category of Best Campus Food .It has seven dining centers which included Squires food court (Au Bon Pain Sbarro), Owens Food Court, Hokie Grill (Chick-fil-A, Pizza Hut, Cinnabon), D2 DXpress, Shultz Shultz Express, Deet s Place, and the high end West End Market. Virginia Tech also has a catering center, Personal Touch Catering.

五、Affiliated institutions

1、Edward Via Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine

In 2003, a school of osteopathic medicine called the Edward Via Virginia College of Osteopathic Medicine (VCOM) opened in the Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center,an office park adjacent to and owned and operated by the university as a local business incubator. VCOM is incorporated as a private, non-profit institution with no state interest, but it is very closely affiliated with Virginia Tech on an operational level.

2、Hotel Roanoke and Conference Center

Virginia Tech also owns the Hotel Roanoke and Conference Center which was donated to the university by Norfolk Southern in 1989, the hotel is managed by Doubletree Hotels, a division of the Hilton Hotels Corporation.

3、School of Biomedical Engineering and Sciences

In 2002, a biomedical engineering program, called the School of Biomedical Engineering and Sciences (SBES), was created as a cooperative venture between Virginia Tech and Wake Forest University. SBES offers opportunities to undergraduates and grants M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in biomedical engineering.

4、T.C. Williams School of Law

Virginia Tech has recently developed a relationship with the T.C. Williams School of Law at the University of Richmond located in Richmond, Virginia. The relationship consists of a joint degree program between the VT College of Science and Richmond Law, which allows a student entering VT to earn both a B.S. from VT and a J.D. from Richmond in a total of six years.

5、Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine

The Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine, founded in 1978, is a separate institution on the same campus, funded by the Commonwealth of Virginia and the state of Maryland and jointly operated by VT and the University of Maryland. VMRCVM and VT jointly operate an equine center in Leesburg, Virginia, and VMRCVM has a small operation on the University of Maryland s College Park, Maryland campus.

6、Virginia Bioinformatics Institute

The Virginia Bioinformatics Institute (VBI) is a premier bioinformatics, computational biology, and systems biology research facility that opened on the Blacksburg campus of Virginia Tech in 2000. It houses over two-hundred employees, multiple supercomputing clusters, and several DNA sequencers, including a massively-parallel high-throughput Roche GS-FLXsequencer. VBI is dedicated to the study of the biological sciences. The research platform of VBI focuses on the disease triangle of host-pathogen-environment interactions. By using bioinformatics, which combines transdisciplinary approaches to information technology and biology, researchers at VBI interpret and apply vast amounts of biological data generated from basic research to some of today s key challenges in the biomedical, environmental and agricultural sciences. Work at VBI involves collaboration in diverse disciplines such as mathematics, epidemiology, computer science, biology, plant pathology, biochemistry, systems biology, statistics, economics and synthetic biology. The institute develops genomic, proteomic and bioinformatic tools that can be applied to the study of infectious diseases as well as the discovery of new vaccine, drug and diagnostic targets.

7、Virginia Tech Center for European Studies and Architecture

The Virginia Tech Center for European Studies and Architecture (CESA) is Virginia Tech s European campus center and base for operations and support of its programs in the region surrounding Riva San Vitale, a small village in the canton Ticino in southern Switzerland. Housed in the 250 year old Villa Maderni, the Virginia Tech Center for European Studies and Architecture provides a varying degree of academic programs for the undergraduate and graduate students of Virginia Tech. The main offering of the center is its student residence program. In this program, students live in Riva San Vitale and attend classes in the Villa Maderni learning facilities and participate in field trips around Europe that pertain to the current lessons of the program. Other offerings of the center includes summer study abroad programs.

8、Virginia Tech Foundation

The Virginia Tech Foundation, Inc. was formed in 1948 to receive, manage, and disburse private gifts in support of the programs and missions of Virginia Tech. The Foundation is run as a 501(c)(3) corporation governed by a board of directors. The Rector of the Board of Visitors, the president of the Alumni Association, the president of the Athletic Fund, and the president of the University are all members of the Foundation board. The remainder of the board is composed members who are elected by vote of the boards existing members.

Subsidiaries of the Virginia Tech Foundation include Virginia Tech Corporate Research Center, the Hotel Roanoke, the National Public Radio affiliate WVTF Roanoke FM 89.1, the Center for European Studies and Architecture, and the Pete Dye River Course of Virginia Tech.

9、Research computing

In 2003, Virginia Tech created a supercomputer which ranked as the 3rd fastest in the world. The system was made from 1100 dual processor Power Macintosh G5s and cost US$5.2 million. The supercomputer, called System X, was disassembled shortly after it was ranked in order for it to be replaced with Apple s rack-based servers which consume both less space and power. Virginia Tech is in the early stages of developing a replacement for System X.

Internet networking research is an important part of Virginia Tech s history. It has participated in Suranet, Internet2, Abilene, the Lambda Rail and other such networks. Virginia Tech also participates in the management of Net.Work.Virginia and the Mid Atlantic Crossroads.

Virginia Tech plans to have a second supercomputer running by the fall of 2008. The unit will be made of 324 Mac Pro Towers with a theoretical computing capacity of 29 teraflops. The computer is not a replacement for System X and will not be used in the same manner. The new supercomputer will be a purely computer science research system. Uses will include research studying two main areas: power-aware software systems that can adjust performance automatically to maximize ficiency, and distributed shared memory systems that can run existing threaded code on high-performance clusters.