Anne Marion
TCU on Monday announced that its School of Medicine will be named the Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine in honor of the late Anne Burnett Marion’s lifetime of friendship and support, as well as her extraordinary generosity to the TCU School of Medicine.
The estate of the late Anne Burnett Marion and The Burnett Foundation, a charitable foundation based in Fort Worth, have made a second $25 million gift to The Anne W. Marion Endowment in support of the TCU School of Medicine operations in perpetuity.
“During her lifetime, Anne Marion’s support of the university through her service as a trustee and her philanthropy played a vital role in strengthening TCU’s academic profile and reputation,” says TCU Chancellor Victor Boschini in a statement. “Her investment of $50 million in our School of Medicine enhances her legacy and will have a momentous influence on TCU for the next 150 years.”
The Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine, which will be known as the Burnett School of Medicine, welcomed its first class of medical students in July 2019. They will graduate in 2023. The Burnett School of Medicine’s fourth class began in July 2022 bringing the school to full enrollment.
“The history of TCU is beautifully intertwined with the Burnett family’s legacy. It is impossible to imagine where we would be without their generosity and longstanding loyalty. We are grateful to Anne’s daughter, philanthropist Windi Grimes, for the honor of establishing this tribute to her mother, marking her indelible contributions to TCU and generations of physician leaders.”
The first gift ever made by The Burnett Foundation, formerly known as The Anne Burnett Tandy and Charles Tandy Foundation, was to TCU, an endowment in her mother Anne Burnett Tandy’s and Charles Tandy’s names.
Marion gave to nearly every area of the university, culminating with her final gift of $25 million to TCU through The Burnett Foundation, among the most generous gifts in university history. It was a pivotal one for the TCU School of Medicine as it established The Anne W. Marion Endowment to support the students, faculty, and programming of the school permanently.
“This level of generosity will create a lasting legacy through the many doctors who will go onto be physician leaders in their communities and in the field of health care, serving others and changing lives for the better for generations to come,” Boschini says. “We could not be more proud to have our School of Medicine bear her and her family’s great name forever.”
Anne Burnett Marion was a native of Fort Worth and was deeply committed to her community and supporting the future of medical education. Her family ties to the Fort Worth community date to over a century. They have a long history of supporting the priorities of the city and its institutions. The Burnett Foundation has been a generous patron of the city, investing significant resources to enhance the community in myriad ways. The foundation focuses on building capacity in organizations and people through the arts and humanities, education, community affairs, and health and human services.
“Legacy and loyalty have always been Burnett family traits,” Windi Grimes says.“My grandmother’s first foundation gift was to TCU, and it seems fitting that my mother’s last foundation gift goes to support the university as well. My mother was inspired by the TCU School of Medicine, and we hope that the Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine will provide a profound impact to all those it serves.”
The gifts that total $50 million for the School of Medicine strengthen TCU’s endowment and propel the university closer to its $1 billion goal for Lead On: A Campaign for TCU. This historic fundraising effort fuels the university’s strategic plan and positions TCU for even greater success in the future.
“The Anne W. Marion Endowment will provide funds to support our students, faculty and programming for the medical school and continue to fuel our mission of transforming health care by inspiring Empathetic Scholars,” says Stuart D. Flynn, the founding dean of the School of Medicine. “This generosity empowers us to continue recruiting and nurturing talented and diverse students who are shaping the future of medicine and health care in an abundance of ways. We continue to carry out the vision of creating physicians who are knowledgeable and compassionate care givers.”
TCU is also expanding the university’s footprint in Fort Worth into the Near Southside area and Medical District to open a new campus for the Burnett School of Medicine. The four-story, and approximately 100,000-square-foot medical education building will sit at the northeast corner of South Henderson and West Rosedale streets. It will be the academic hub for 240 medical students and hundreds of faculty and staff. Completion is planned for fall 2024, and additional facilities are part of the master plan.