Virginia Tech School of Architecture receives ‘unprecedented’ $20 million gift

Virginia Tech's School of Architecture has received the largest estate gift in its history, with Professor Emeritus Salahuddin Choudhury and his wife, May, committing $20 million to support the future of the program. The endowment is intended to provide school leadership long-term resources to invest in students, faculty, and new initiatives.

Choudhury joined the faculty in 1974 after studying architecture in what is now Bangladesh and earning a master's degree at the University of Minnesota. Over a 47-year teaching career, he became known for encouraging students to think beyond buildings, treating architecture as a discipline shaped as much by philosophy and culture as by design itself.

Describing the gift as an extension of his family's lifelong commitment to education, Choudhury called the endowment a gesture of gratitude for the "intellectual liberty" he found at Virginia Tech.