Excellence Funds

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Often, students and faculty need support to travel to high profile meetings to present research results. Or an exceptional graduate student prospect may not commit to Virginia Tech unless we can match a competitive stipend offer made by another institution. Usually, the department must find private support to enable these sorts of “excellence”. Our department has two excellence funds:

The Friends of Biology Excellence Fund is an endowed fund that will support, in perpetuity, excellence in scholarship for students and faculty. To make a contribution to this fund, write “Biology Excellence Fund” on the bottom of your check. Message from our Alumni Advisory Board

The John Cairns Jr. Excellence Fund is named in honor of Dr. John Cairns, a recently retired, world-renowned environmental toxicologist and aquatic biologist who trained many of the most prominent scientists in these fields of study. The ultimate goal of this fund is to build an endowed faculty chair named for Dr. Cairns. While the fund is growing, it will be used to support excellence in scholarship. To contribute to this fund, write “Cairns Excellence Fund” on the bottom of your check.