2025-2026 Academic Catalog
Welcome to Virginia Tech! We are excited that you are here planning your time as a Hokie.
Welcome to Virginia Tech! We are excited that you are here planning your time as a Hokie.
The college creates, integrates, and shares knowledge to enhance:
We address current and emerging issues in agricultural and life sciences by building on the land-grant commitment of developing leaders and creating and sharing knowledge through diverse, hands-on applications.
The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences embraces the following core values:
In the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, our ambition to help communities thrive is at the center of our identity. We have identified four major strengths of CALS—food, health, economy, and environment—that we will continue to explore as we seek to help communities thrive. Using these strengths, our work will address many of the grand challenges facing our world, including comprehensive health and wellness, community empowerment, predictive environmental solutions, cultivating lifelong learners, and resilience and efficiency through innovation. There is room for us to excel and grow while focusing on the theme of building thriving communities. By working together, we can all thrive.
The undergraduate program in the college is organized into majors designed for students with widely different interests. These majors permit the student to achieve a satisfactory degree of specialization while providing the fundamentals necessary for continuing professional growth after graduation.
Freshman students may enter the college with the designation LFSC (Exploring Life Sciences). Upon completion of the freshman year, a college major should be selected.
Students who plan to transfer to Virginia Tech and major in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences after two years of community college enrollment are encouraged to complete as many of the Pathways curriculum courses as possible before they transfer.
The college offers three transdisciplinary and experiential-based minors: Food, Agriculture, and Society (FAS), Integrative Health and Wellness (IHW), and Global Food Security and Health (GFSH). The FAS and GFSH are Pathways minors. A cross-campus team of faculty, staff, students, and community partners collaborate to deliver these minors.
Students will be encouraged to put their passion, creativity, and soul into finding themselves through well-being.
The mission of the Leadership and Social Change Residential College is to offer students a theoretical foundation combined with the practical knowledge and skills necessary to lead in a complex global environment.
Students are encouraged to participate in internship and co-op opportunities to gain relevant work experience prior to graduation. Departmental career advisors can help students identify opportunities. In most cases, students receive credit for qualifying work experience. Enrichment studies include research field study opportunities, study abroad and summer laboratory experiences outside the university.
Research opportunities and experiencing the excitement of discovery can play an important part in undergraduate training in science. College of Agriculture and Life Sciences departments and schools offer diverse research opportunities in which students may choose to participate. Individuals interested in undergraduate research should contact faculty members in the department or school where they wish to conduct research.
The Academic Programs Office in the college, in cooperation with the Global Education Office, offers several avenues for students both in and outside the college to gain international knowledge and experience. These study opportunities allow students and faculty to become aware of and develop basic knowledge of food, fiber, and environmental issues in the world. Specific activities include study abroad programs and courses, international internships, formal student exchange programs, seminars and workshops on campus, and courses in the college, which focus on international topics. All of the departments in the college offer education abroad opportunities and students wishing to explore these opportunities should contact their advisor.
Students are assigned an advisor for their major during academic advising and course registration at Virginia Tech. In order to put together a solid plan to finish a degree, advising is critical. Advisors in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences are among the best resources on campus. In fact, they consistently win awards for the quality of advising they provide. Virginia Tech is a big university, but advisors make it seem like a small town where everyone knows everyone else.
Each year approximately 50% of our graduating students continue their education in graduate or professional school. Pre-health advising (e.g. pre-dentistry, pre-medicine, and pre-veterinary) is coordinated through the Office of Health Professions located in Career and Professional Development.
Career advising is available from a number of sources. The university offers centralized career services and on-campus interviewing. The College of Agriculture and Life Sciences works with employers interested in hiring students with degrees from the college and organizes employer panels and information sessions. The college offers two career fairs each year. The university office of Career and Professional Development also offers several job/career fairs throughout the year, which gives students the opportunity to connect with potential employers.
Career and Professional Development also offers each student access to a computerized program to connect students with potential employers. Undergraduate students who are seeking any type of career-related employment, including internships, co-ops, career-related summer employment, and permanent positions are eligible to use this system.
College and departmental scholarships are available for students enrolled in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Applications are accepted through the University's Scholarship Central. Descriptions and deadlines are available on the Scholarships and Financial Aid website at www.finaid.vt.edu.
Gamma Sigma Delta - Gamma Sigma Delta is an organization having as its objectives the advancement of agriculture in all its phases, the maintenance and improvement of the relations of agriculture and related sciences to other industries, and the recognition of the responsibilities of those engaged in all aspects of agriculture to humankind. Our Society seeks to encourage high standards of scholarship and worthy achievements in all branches of the agricultural and related sciences as well as a high degree of excellence in the practice of agricultural pursuits.
Phi Kappa Phi - Phi Kappa Phi has chapters on nearly 300 select college and university campuses in North America and the Philippines. Membership is by invitation only to the top 10 percent of seniors and graduate students and 7.5 percent of juniors. Faculty, professional staff, and alumni who have achieved scholarly distinction also qualify. The Society's mission is "To recognize and promote academic excellence in all fields of higher education and to engage the community of scholars in service to others."
Phi Beta Kappa - Phi Beta Kappa is the oldest and most prestigious honor society dedicated to recognizing excellence in the liberal arts and sciences. Students in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences who have exhibited outstanding academic ability in eligible coursework may be eligible for selection to Phi Beta Kappa.
All College of Agriculture and Life Sciences departments offer graduate degrees at both the Master and Ph.D. levels. There is also an Online Master of Agricultural and Life Sciences (OMALS) degree program (with 8 different concentrations) that is an approved accelerated undergraduate to graduate degree. Complete information on these programs including descriptions of graduate courses can be found in the Graduate Catalog.
Dean: Mario Ferruzzi
Associate Dean & Director of Academic Programs: Susan S. Sumner
Associate Dean & Director of Virginia Agricultural Experiment Station: Mary Burrows
Associate Dean & Director of Virginia Cooperative Extension: Michael Gutter
Associate Dean & Director of Global Programs: Thomas L. Thompson
Assistant Dean of Academic Programs: Chevon N. Thorpe
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