You are right on about the low alumni giving record. VT President Sands has recognized this and has observed publicly that the giving record is comparatively low, despite the fact that alumni respect and pride in VT is very high comparatively. He sees that, rightly, as opportunity to improve, and VT has steps to properly staff and organize a better effort. It will be rolled out soon. The same is true of giving to sports. I think all giving at VT has been run too much in an amateurish way, but that is going to change under this new president and new athletic director.

Thanks for your comments. I would like to review for you briefly the saga of VT getting into the ACC. It should have happened in 1954 when the ACC was organized. However, Coach Frank Howard at Clemson was POed at Tech for opposing bowl participation in the old Southern and particularly the attitude could have affected Clemson intent to participate. So he basically black-balled VT and kept them out when the conference was formed because he resented the past position of VT which could have affected Clemson. By that time, however, Tech has seen the light, and had since 1951 an athletic director that wanted to participate in bowls and wanted higher level participation than had been the case in the immediate years after WWII.

Then, there were multiple attempts to get into the ACC over the years, and Clemson switched to being a supporter of the VT effort. Thanks for that! By the way, I started at VT in 1951 and personally observed this saga over the years. So, when you see attitudes by older alumni, they have been formed over many years of frustration. And, it created a resentment of some ACC schools. Speaking for myself, I think NC schools, along with Virginia, were the prime culprits in keeping Tech out of the ACC over the years. But, I could be wrong about any of them.