Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, September 28, 1994 TAG: 9409280053
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: STEPHEN FOSTER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
Tech announced Tuesday that it had received $11.5 million in gifts that will help provide scholarships, endow professorships, buy research equipment and create new programs.
Robert B. Pamplin Sr. and his son, Robert B. Pamplin Jr., gave $3.5 million to Tech's Pamplin College of Business, a school whose name recognizes the family's $20 million in contributions over the years.
An anonymous donor representing the estate of a deceased alumnus has contributed $8 million, some of which will go toward building and buying equipment for Tech's Biotechnology Center. Another portion will help fund the center's outreach program, which assists high school biology teachers, and yet another portion will go toward developing new executive training and business leadership programs.
The Pamplins, who less than two years ago donated $5.5 million to the college, own the Portland, Ore.-based R.B. Pamplin Corp., which operates textile mills in the Southeast and sand, gravel, concrete and asphalt operations in the Northwest. The senior Pamplin is a 1933 Tech graduate in business administration and a former chairman and chief executive officer of Georgia-Pacific Corp. His son, a businessman and minister, attended Tech from 1960-1962 before finishing school at Lewis and Clark College in Portland.
"I hope I do not sound like a broken record in underscoring what the Pamplins mean to this university ... since there have been so many occasions through the years to express our gratitude," Tech President Paul Torgersen said in a news release.
Half of the money donated this time will be used as an endowment to fund 20 new scholarships for incoming freshmen, and half will support about five new professorships and supplement five existing endowed professorships, said T.W. "Hap" Bonham, the college's associate dean for administration and research.
"What it allows us to do is to recruit and retain outstanding students and professors," said Sookhan Ho, the college's public relations coordinator.
Exactly how the endowment money from the other gift, totaling $8 million, will be used has not been decided, Tech officials said. The university will receive about $400,000 annually from the endowment, about half of which will be used in the biotechnology outreach program and to purchase equipment for the center.
That $8.5 million project is under construction and should be built by August, said Tracy Wilkins, the center's director. "It's going to be a great help to our teaching efforts, both here at Tech and across the state," Wilkins said.
The other endowment money will go toward developing executive training and business leadership programs throughout the university, said Larry Hincker, director of university relations.
by CNB