Charles Steger

Through triumph and tragedy, Charles Steger kept Tech pointed toward excellence.

Charles Steger earned three degrees from Virginia Tech and devoted most of his professional life to his alma mater, working tirelessly to push it into the top tier of the nation’s elite universities. When he steps down in the next year as Tech’s 15th president, he will leave a voluminous legacy that includes major academic and research advances, a significant expansion of the university’s footprint, and the darkest days in the history of the Blacksburg campus.

Steger moved into the president’s office at the dawn of a new millennium and moved Tech on a path toward elevating its research enterprise and redefining its land-grant mission for a rapidly changing economy. Since 2000, the university has increased its research portfolio by more than 300 percent. It has established seven centralized research institutes, positioning the school to win large-scale research grants.

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by Elizabeth W. Payne

Re: “Va. Tech adopts fees for 2013-14” (April 29 news story):

The Virginia Tech Board of Visitors faced some hard decisions in dealing with the increasing cost of an education at Tech. I am not debating any of the issues, but do wish to express an opinion on differential pricing for high-demand degrees.

Considering the outcry from many sources of the need to educate more students in math, science, engineering and high-technology fields, I question the prudence of Rector George Noland’s suggestion to increase the costs of that type of degree in coming years.

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Payne, a professor emerita from Virginia Western Community College, lives in Roanoke.

Taking cellphones and the scientific process on the road.

What driver, himself able to negotiate city traffic and winding rural roadways flawlessly while reading and writing text messages, has not seen how dangerously inattentive fellow motorists are while doing same?

“O would some power the gift to give us to see ourselves as others see us.”

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Give Gov. Bob McDonnell credit for making higher education funding a priority in his administration and following through on his commitment to state colleges and universities.

The General Assembly unanimously passed McDonnell’s Virginia Higher Education Opportunity Act in 2011, laying a foundation to increase college enrollment and degree attainment by in-state students and boost the number of degrees awarded in high-demand areas such as science, technology, engineering and health care.

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The new Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute is being squeezed by the first wave of sequester cuts.

Those in the Roanoke Valley who think sequestration is a funny word that has no effect on their lives had best start paying attention. Total Action for Progress recently announced that three Head Start classrooms are being lost to federal budget cuts. Now comes word that the Virginia Tech Carilion Research Institute has been hit with $640,000 in grant reductions.

While local residents may find it hard to fully grasp the science behind the biomedical research being conducted in their midst on brain injuries and cancer, they can more easily understand its importance to the region’s current and future economy. The institute is attracting some of the nation’s best researchers, and promises to generate spin-off companies in the not-too-distant future.

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Forty-five senators defied the will of a majority of their colleagues and of Americans.

This week, people gathered at Virginia Tech to remember the young men and women and their courageous professors who were slain six years ago.

Students at New River Community College returned to classes, but their thoughts were with a classmate and a college employee still recovering from gunshot wounds inflicted just days ago.

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Michael Sluss, The Roanoke Times

By Michael Sluss

While driving from Roanoke to Christiansburg Monday evening, mindful that I had this column to write, I rattled the memory bank for recollections of the two years I worked in this newspaper’s New River Valley Bureau before leaving to cover the state Capitol in 2000.

Dozens of news stories came to mind — fun features, horrific accidents, big court cases, amazing research at Virginia Tech. What stood out, though, were memories of the places I visited and the people I met while living and working here.

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Sluss is an editorial writer for The Roanoke Times.

by Larry Hincker

Christina Nuckols’ column on Virginia Tech’s scientific research and evaluation of the Southside uranium deposit, “Tech’s ties to uranium cash raise questions,” March 10, itself raises questions. I am concerned the innuendo of the headline and other aspects of the column imply a bias on the part of the university or its scientists.

It is ironic that this column appeared during Sunshine Week, an effort by statewide media to focus attention on government transparency. This is based on the belief that effective government follows open access to information.

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Hincker is associate vice president for university relations at Virginia Tech.

Sunshine Week, the annual celebration of open government, starts today. In past years, I have marked this occasion with investigations into public records and meetings. I shared information the government owes the people under the Freedom of Information Act.

This year, instead of looking at what FOIA means to the people, I want to share what it looks like from the perspective of the gatekeepers, the public servants who must abide by it.

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Christian Trejbal was an editorial writer for The Roanoke Times and was based in the New River Valley. This is his last column. You can reach him on Twitter at @ctrejbal.

A Clifton Forge/Virginia Tech partnership earns national praise.

If there is such a thing as architectural trash talk, the townspeople of Clifton Forge have earned the right to let loose with some well-earned community pride.

The Masonic Amphitheatre at the center of downtown is the American-Architects Building of the Year for 2012. The cultural venue beat out the Brooklyn Botanic Garden Visitor Center and a solar home in Venice, Calif., in online voting by architects, engineers and designers.

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