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BLACKSBURG – The Virginia Tech Athletics Department announced Friday the launching of a new mission statement and core values that align with the university’s overall mission and reflect its ideals as the department moves forward in an ever-changing NCAA landscape.

The department’s new mission statement is as follows: “Virginia Tech Athletics is committed to excellence, both academically and athletically, and to the personal development of our student-athletes. In the spirit of Ut Prosim, we stand together to serve and represent our university and community with integrity and respect.”

The department’s five core values are integrity, service, honor, excellence, and strong together. Two members of the department, Megan Caligiuri, senior director of HokieVision and Anne Panella, director of publications, teamed to create a logo, with the inspiration for the logo coming from the eight pylons at War Memorial Court on the Drillfield, one of the signature landmarks on the Virginia Tech campus. Those pylons evoke the core values of the university.

“After giving it a lot of thought, our team feels like this is the perfect foundation for the athletics department going forward,” Tech Director of Athletics Whit Babcock said. “It’s important to us to represent the same things that our university represents and to be ‘Strong Together.’ We want our department, our staff, our coaches and our student-athletes to exemplify those core values, and those core values will ideally be the foundation of every decision we make.”

The process to come up with a new mission statement and core values was an inclusive one, and the senior staff initiated it. Babcock and his executive staff formed a committee to develop the new mission statement and core values, and that committee solicited and received input from various entities on campus. The committee was comprised of (in alphabetical order): Bridget Brugger McSorley (director, compliance and title IX), Chris Helms (senior associate athletic director, sports administration), Kevin Jones (special assistant to the athletics director), Tim Parker (senior associate athletics director, compliance), Desiree Reed-Francois (executive associate athletics director), Ned Skinner (head men’s and women’s swimming coach) and Danny White (assistant athletics director, student-athlete development).

The committee sought input from Dr. Timothy Sands, the university’s president, and his staff. The committee also made a presentation to the University Athletic Council (UAC), chaired by Dr. Art Keown, the head of the Department of Finance, Insurance and Business Law at Virginia Tech. Athletics department officials made a presentation to the university’s Board of Visitors as well.

The committee also sought the opinions of the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), Tech’s coaching staffs, and the athletics department’s staff. The committee then reviewed and revised the mission statement and core values based on feedback from all those groups.

These core values will be central to the department’s hiring, evaluation, and recognition processes. Additionally, the athletics department will display the logo within facilities, such as the Jamerson Athletics Center and Cassell Coliseum, and within select publications and select stories on hokiesports.com.

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