The theme of this issue — innovation — surrounds us here at Texas Christian University.

In our 150th year, our core mission still centers on providing an education that inspires students to think boldly to benefit the greater good.

Opal’s Farm in Fort Worth is one of three urban farms where TCU students and faculty members are trying to put healthy foods on tables. Photo by Leo Wesson

The cover story takes you into the lives of six medical students as they complete their fourth and final year in the Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine at Texas Christian University. You’ll discover what’s next for these compassionate, communicative physicians as they apply their trailblazing health care education and become the new generation of surgeons, internists, radiologists, obstetrician-gynecologists and psychiatrists.

Here’s another success story that impacts communities close to home: TCU faculty members and students are leading a grassroots effort to put healthy foods on tables and in backyards of underserved areas. Interdisciplinary efforts by three TCU geology and business professors secured a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to transform vacant lots in an east Fort Worth food desert into urban farms. Last year Opal’s Farm — named for living legend and TCU honorary degree recipient Dr. Opal Lee — produced 5 tons of food on just 1 of its 5 acres.

In the big idea department: For more than a century, Texas has been known for oil and gas — could lithium be next? Dave Leopold ’96 MBA, CEO of Fort Worth-based TotalEnergies E&P-Barnett, is involved in a pilot program that bridges the fossil fuel industry to the global focus on sustainable energy by recovering lithium from briny wastewater generated by oil and gas production. Lithium, used in rechargeable batteries for cellphones and electric vehicles, is at peak demand now and critical to a carbon-neutral future.

Horned Frogs are also working to solve one of our biggest challenges — the availability of fresh water throughout the world. Growing populations, climate extremes and contaminants create questions and an urgent mission for TCU researchers, who help students find solutions for troubled waters.

What’s next in your own life? Ann Marie Warren ’93 studies resilience in people who’ve experienced some form of trauma — that’s nearly 70 percent of us — and offers advice for tapping into our own resilience.

The quests and achievements of these inspiring Horned Frogs assure me that the future is in excellent hands. Bring on the next 150 years as we Lead On!

Victor J. Boschini, Jr.

Chancellor

Above: Quinn Losefsky ’19, second from left, assists in surgery. She has wanted to become a surgeon since junior high school and began working with Fort Worth-area patients during her first year at the Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine at Texas Christian University. Photo by Joyce Marshall