Conversation and taste-tests were on the menu when Chancellor Daniel W. Pullin joined Chancellor’s Scholars for a cooking class. TCU Marketing & Communication

Every August, before the first class meets, our newest students sit down with faculty and staff for the Frogs First Family Dinner. Before a single syllabus changes hands, we gather around a table, and that tells students something essential about TCU: Community here is not incidental. It is the point.

Food has always been how communities say you belong here. This issue of TCU Magazine celebrates the alumni, students, faculty and staff who built their lives around nourishing others — from the NFL alum-turned-barbecue pitmaster to the vegan chef who reversed his own diabetes through intentional food choices.

Sharing with others is one way we turn values into action. Our students volunteer in the Food Recovery Network to collect unserved food from our dining halls and deliver it to neighbors in need across Fort Worth.

The roots run deep: History professor Rebecca Sharpless reveals how wheat quietly underwrote North Texas culture and civic life for more than a century. Food, it turns out, has always shaped who we are.

Fort Worth and TCU set a generous table, and I am grateful every day for the chance to pull up a chair.

Lead On and Go Frogs!