Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Tech board pledges support to 'VT-Engage' project
The board also approves funds to design a new public safety building.
BLACKSBURG -- Virginia Tech's Board of Visitors heard details Monday of a community service project to honor the victims of April 16 and approved funding to design a public safety building proposed in the wake of the shootings.
Vice Provost for Outreach and International Affairs John Dooley said the community service project will not be a one-time event and plans for it were being discussed before April 16. But in July the family of a victim proposed giving the project special meaning this year.
"They came to us and said, 'We would like to, in a special way, help you focus and affirm the contributions of the people who lost their lives,' " Dooley told the board's academic affairs committee Monday.
The plan is for "VT-Engage" to begin with a kickoff event Oct. 16 and for everyone in the university community to complete 10 hours of service by April 16. That would amount to more than 300,000 hours of community service in six months. Volunteers would not be limited to the Blacksburg campus or to people who are employed or enrolled by the university.
Each member of the board filled out community service pledge cards Monday and gave them to Dooley.
Tech's motto, "Ut Prosim," is Latin for "that I may serve" and Dooley said the service work so many of the victims were involved in became evident in tributes written after their deaths.
"Let's have fun and bring hope and meaning to what we're about," he said.
A Web site is being created that will have suggestions and contact information for people who want to serve. Dooley said more details about the project would be released later this week.
The board also voted to go ahead with the design of a public safety building, a proposal included in the university's internal review of the shootings released last week.
The design phase request was for $1.6 million and the estimated cost of the project is $20 million. The university is going to ask the state to fund the project -- a two-story, 35,000-square-foot building that would likely be located in the large fenced parking lot off Duck Pond Drive. It would house Tech's police, rescue squad and emergency management operations all under the same roof.
