Amy Parsons: Hi, I’m Amy Parsons, president of Colorado State University and host of The Next 150 podcast. We have so many remarkable people in our community, and this is where we’re going to hear their stories. We’re going to get their perspectives on CSU’s next 150 years and gather their very best advice for today’s CSU students. Let’s get started, Rams.

Well, hello, Rams. Thank you for joining us for another episode of The Next 150. I’m really excited today to be joined by three very special guests, two of our researchers from CSU’s College of Veterinary Health and Biomedical Sciences, Dr. Stephanie McGrath and Dr. Julie Moreno, who are engaged in some groundbreaking research around brain health that we’re going to explore today. Dr. Stephanie McGrath is a veterinary neurologist and associate professor in our Department of Clinical Sciences and director of CSU’s Brain Research Center, where she leads clinical trials focused on canine and feline aging and cognitive decline, brain tumor therapies, and epilepsy. Dr. Julie Moreno is a neurotoxicologist and associate professor in our Department of Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences and associate director of our Brain Research Center. Dr. Moreno’s research focuses on brain aging, and she’s especially passionate about mentoring the next generation of scientists, which I’m excited to talk about. So thank you both for being here.

So as I said, I actually have three guests on the podcast today. The third guest is this fellow, which for those of you who are watching, you can see, is my pug El Jefe. El Jefe also has a very important job because he is a participant in the dog aging study. So he has a very important job. El Jefe is a very advanced age. Our family adopted him actually from Mexico probably 12 years ago. He was not in the best of health when we found him. He was a little homeless guy. Thanks to the veterinarians here at CSU, we really worked on him and got him back to good health. He’s had a long happy life with our family, and we’re really excited that he can now in his advanced age have a big job participating in this research study. So thank you for that.

Stephanie McGrath: Thank you.

Amy Parsons: And thank you, Jefe, for being here today. So we’re sitting down talking about your research at a really exciting time. You recently had a visit from Anderson Cooper, talking about your work for an episode of 60 Minutes. So talk about what that was like to meet Anderson Cooper and to talk about your research.

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah, I can start. I will say two very honest things, I think, is, one, he is a wonderful person. The whole crew at 60 Minutes was amazing. So I would say it was extremely exciting and actually a little bit more relieving than I was expecting my nerves to handle.

Amy Parsons: Yeah.

Stephanie McGrath: The second thing, I would say, kind of a very strong feeling of pride, of being really excited to be able to showcase the work that Julie and I have been kind of relentlessly pursuing. So I felt really excited and proud that we were able to have it showcased in 60 Minutes.

Amy Parsons: Yeah, absolutely. How about you, Julie?

Julie Moreno: I think both of those things. You’re right. We were both very nervous for it to happen, but then once we were doing it, it felt very comfortable. Him and his team were amazing. To add on this, I think it’s also just how amazing it is to have your work showcased in that way. I feel just very lucky, most scientists don’t get that experience, right? Usually, media is not what we all do, and that’s big time media. So it was just really cool too. There’s no other way to say it, but it was just a surreal cool feeling to be there.

Stephanie McGrath: Surreal.

Amy Parsons: Yeah, absolutely. So he was here talking about the Dog Aging Project, which is what El Jefe is participating in. So talk to us about the project. I know that you also have a dog enrolled in the project as well, and has been for a while. So talk to us about the origins of the project.

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah. So the Dog Aging Project is actually a huge study that’s funded by the NIH and some philanthropy dollars that is multi-institutional. So lots of different institutions and universities and even private practices participate. And of course, lots of owners. There’s over 50,000 dogs enrolled, which is really exciting.

Amy Parsons: Wow.

Stephanie McGrath: So that’s kind of the big umbrella project. And then what Julie and I and some collaborators, namely Dr. Dirk Keene, over at the University of Washington, what we created is sort of a add-on studies. So we took a subset, which El Jefe is in, of those dogs and are really diving into the science of brain aging and brain health. And that’s what’s called the Brain Health Study. So it’s sort of an additional project that takes advantage of this giant infrastructure and sort of national cohort of dogs. So it is really exciting to be able to look at specifically the brain as it ages in dogs.

Amy Parsons: Yeah. Talk about the Brain Health Study itself, what you hope to accomplish in it, maybe what you’re finding already through this study.

Julie Moreno: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Stephanie McGrath: You want to start?

Julie Moreno: Yeah. One of our main findings that we’ve been able to do over the last few years is that these dogs, as they age, their brain actually looks like they have a human type of Alzheimer’s disease or dementia, and we can see that pathologically. So actually looking at the brains. That’s really critical, because in science, in the field of looking at these dementias, it’s really hard for us to do that in the laboratory. So these dogs allow us to see things like what the dogs may be exposed to in their own environment. They go home with their owners, they live with their owners. So it’s really exciting because not only can we eventually maybe understand the disease better for the dogs, but really understand the disease better for humans, because the world of understanding how the brain ages is very, very difficult to study. Right? So these dogs allow us a window into that because they’re living with us and exposed to those same things.

Amy Parsons: Yeah. So from a scientific standpoint, when you have a dog like El Jefe in the clinical trial, what is it that you’re looking at? I know that he’s been through an MRI. He goes through cognitive test. Luckily he’s very, as you can see, treat-motivated.

Julie Moreno: Yes, it’s a good thing.

Amy Parsons: So he loves participating in the study. But what is it that you’re specifically looking for at first when you bring a dog in and then what you see over time?

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah. So the cool thing, well, cool and not cool thing, about dogs is that they age a lot more quickly than humans. So unlike human studies, trying to look at healthy brains and brains that age, either in a good way or a not good way, meaning that dementia of some sort, is really hard. That would take many decades to look at a 30-year-old until death. But in dogs, we’re able to actually do that. El Jefe is older, but we enroll any dog over the age of one, and then we monitor them for their entire life. Our hope is that we’re able to gather all of this information, the cognitive testing, the brain imaging. So we image them once a year, doing an MRI. We collect spinal fluid, blood, and we collect a ton of other lifestyle information. So environmental data, what exposures are they living with? So wildfire smoke, well water, water pollutants, other secondhand smoke, other types of things that we are also exposed to, but not lab animals.

Amy Parsons: Interesting.

Stephanie McGrath: So then we can start to, hopefully, that’s kind of Julie’s side, is build this database of knowledge that helps us understand what factors may lead to dementia versus not. So that’s kind of the big overarching goal of the project. So we monitor them every six months throughout their whole life. And again, it’s not something that we can do in humans. So it’s something that we can attain in dogs.

Amy Parsons: Yeah.

Julie Moreno: Yeah. So we’ll take those samples, the blood samples, or maybe the changes that you see in the MRI images. And then we can see, okay, well what’s in the blood? Is there any markers that allow us to say, “This dog looks like they might get cognitive decline as they age”? Or when they do end up aging and passing, can we then see what their brain looked like, physically looked like? And then correlate that back to how they did on their cognitive test. So did they end up having dementia both in the behavior steps, all those treat essays? And then also, what does it physically look like? And can I detect those signals that say that that dog had dementia?

Amy Parsons: That’s fascinating. Has anything surprised you in the study so far of what you’re finding or not finding as you go through?

Stephanie McGrath: I mean, you’re probably the one that sees the most.

Julie Moreno: For me, I think the biggest surprise has been how similar it looks to a human brain when they’re sick. And that’s through collaborations or collaborators that are human pathologists, will look at the dog brain pathology, and they’re even shocked that it looks so similar to a human.

Amy Parsons: Really? Wow.

Julie Moreno: To me, that was one of those days I texted Steph, and I was like, “Oh, my gosh, this is so exciting,” just because this is… I think we both really believe this would be a one way for us to really understand human brain aging and human disease so much better, because a mouse brain doesn’t look like a human brain. So for me, that was the shocking and exciting part of it.

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah. I think for me, I don’t know if it’s surprising, but I think the most sort of exciting or proud part of the study is how devoted owners are to this study, pet owners. I was nervous when we started this, and to be able to have hundreds of dogs and therefore owners be able to participate and agree to a study like this, and otherwise healthy dogs or older dogs that aren’t healthy, either way, that they’re so dedicated to the science and to what we’re doing, that they’re willing to take time out of their lives to bring dogs to us and allow them to participate in all these tests. I think it’s a good experience overall. And I get such positive feedback from owners. Originally, it was sort of criticized, like, “There’s no way people are going to agree to this,” as you know, and you know.

Amy Parsons: Yeah.

Julie Moreno: Yeah.

Stephanie McGrath: It’s something that people are actually really excited to be a part of. So I think that’s what’s been the most sort of surprising and also really exciting thing for me.

Amy Parsons: That’s so interesting. It’s a special skill that you have and that so many at CVMBS have at the vet med hospital to work with the owners, the companions of these pets through all these different circumstances.

What is that like to work with families and pets, bringing them in? I mean, I know for our family, El Jefe is quite old. We’re all just so proud that he is part of this study and contributing to important science behind it here as he’s nearing the tail end of his long, happy life. I mean, it means a lot for our family to have him in the study, and he obviously really enjoys being in the study as well. But what’s that working with all of these different families and their pets in the study?

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah. Well, he’s also a CSU Ram now.

Amy Parsons: He is. He is a Ram. Yes. He dresses as CAM the Ram for Halloween sometimes. Yeah.

Stephanie McGrath: I think that’s the most fun for us. Honestly, I can’t even take the credit. It’s my team who you and your family have met on a number of occasions, and they’re really the superstars in all of this, I think. Just the way that they’re able to interact with pet owners, and I think it’s just such a great team and environment. And for the dogs, the dogs love it. I mean, people are like, “Ooh, they’re going to get a blood draw.” But there’s so many fun things that happen during all these visits, that even he gets a pep in his stuff when he’s walking down the hall.

Amy Parsons: He does. Yeah.

Stephanie McGrath: They’re excited. They come in. I mean, we have so many pet owners that are like, “Oh my gosh, my dog trembles in the car historically, and I get to your guys’s hospital, and it’s like he jumps out of the car and runs into the hospital.”

Amy Parsons: Love it.

Stephanie McGrath: So I think it’s really rewarding for us to be able to interact with pet owners and their families and their pets. Even at the end, which I know is a tough thing to talk about, I think the pet owners, the amount of cards and gratitude and emails that we’ve received that have been just so grateful even after death, that their dog was able and is still able to forever contribute in this way, is so meaningful for them. And it’s sort of the lemonade out of lemons, right?

Amy Parsons: Yeah, absolutely.

Stephanie McGrath: So that feels good for us.

Amy Parsons: I can attest to that. That’s how we feel about it in our family as well.

Talk a little bit about Jefe’s tests and what he’s done in MRI, he’s done these clinical tests over there, sort of what you’re seeing in him and what you’re testing for when he’s in the clinic.

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah, great question. So two big cognitive or behavioral type aspects of these dogs are really fascinating to us. One is owner-based. So as you guys know, filling out the surveys, what are you seeing at home? Are there any changes? And as owners, you guys take them every six months. So sort of monitoring what the owner perceives to be occurring, which is incredibly important. There’s only so much we can gather at the hospital. So in the hospital, Dr. Evan MacLean, a PhD professor at the University of Arizona, developed this sort of battery of tests that we do with these guys, which are super fun. So we have little tests where we hide treats behind these little blinds, and they have to go find them. We have a little cylinder where we put it in one side of the cylinder, and they have to be able to remember which side they… One side’s closed, one’s open.

So especially dogs like El Jefe that love treats are very motivated. So it really tests their memory, executive function, sort of that higher cognitive level. Sorry, President Parsons, but I would say he’s a B.

Amy Parsons: He’s a B student. Yeah.

Stephanie McGrath: He tries very hard.

Amy Parsons: He tries very hard, loves his treats.

Stephanie McGrath: He loves his treats. He just sometimes forgets where they were placed.

Amy Parsons: Yes, yes.

Stephanie McGrath: So yeah, it’s really fun. And then the next day, they go under anesthesia for their MRI and spinal tap. And in that, we’re looking at their brains. So we’re looking at different tracks in the brain, seeing whether things start changing over time in dogs that develop memory loss and dogs that don’t. So we’re sort of comparing those images over time.

Julie Moreno: Yeah.

Amy Parsons: Yeah. Also, as part of the study, and we don’t like to talk about it too much, I’ll cover his little ears, but in the long, long distant future, when he passes away, the dogs in the studies pass away, you actually take samples of their brain at that time. So talk about that aspect of the study.

Stephanie McGrath: Well, the samples actually go directly to Julie’s lab.

Julie Moreno: So in my lab, we’re able to process the brains. It’s really probably the best way for us to start to understand what’s happening to brains as they age and when they have disease like dementias. What we can do is we can look at the cell level. So when a dog or a human has one of these types of dementias, what’s really happening is, the cells were really stressed. We don’t always understand, or we don’t quite understand yet, what’s happening to those cells that make people have these behavioral changes.

So El Jefe is trying to find the treat, and he just can’t. There’s probably a lot of cellular stress that’s happening in the brain. So if we can understand that better, it would be really awesome because then we can also try to think of ways to stop that cellular stress. That cellular stress is, if you can stop it, maybe you could prolong people’s lives as they have these diseases. So that’s one of the big, big goals, I think, kind of larger goals for me and Steph, is can we understand the brain enough at the cellular level to then intervene, and have a therapy or a treatment for the dogs, and then maybe eventually humans as well for these diseases?

Amy Parsons: So it’s interesting how you both are extraordinary researchers and have really dedicated so much of your careers to studying brain health and disease prevention, but you’re coming at it from different ways, which is what makes for such an extraordinary team. Take us back just a little bit about your path and what interested you in this in the first place and led you to do this work at CSU.

Julie Moreno: Yeah, you want me to start?

Stephanie McGrath: Yes.

Julie Moreno: So I’ve always studied since I got my PhD here actually at CSU. I have done a lot of work with using cells and culture, or using rodent models, so mouse models, to look at neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson’s or other kind of prion diseases. So brain diseases has always been my kind of fascination with that. My work has been based on looking at the brain. But I kept thinking we’re just not getting much, we’re not getting very far with the mice. A lot of the therapies out there for humans were coming from mouse work, and then failing when they would get into clinical trials.

I then had the really great opportunity to meet Steph about six years ago now, and we were talking about how there’s this disease or syndrome that happens in dogs, most commonly known as doggy dementia. And I thought, I wonder if we could study in the dogs the same disease, and wouldn’t that be better as a signal, as a stepping stone from what we know in mice? Because they’re super important in knowing, again, at that cellular stress level, what’s happening. You can do a lot of things with the mice. But we needed a middle man, if you will. We needed a middle spot before humans, and we both thought maybe dogs would be that way, and she was seeing dogs in the clinic with this dementia. So then that kind of spearheaded our collaboration in partnership.

Amy Parsons: Yeah. How about you, Steph?

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah. Similarly, I think we sort of… I was encountering it more and more in the clinic, this dementia, these signs of dementia in dogs. Just like in humans with Alzheimer’s, we have no treatment. We can treat some of the signs or symptoms, but we have no broadly effective treatment for preventing or stopping the disease, or even reversing signs. So I was getting frustrated. The healthcare system in veterinary medicine, as you know, is getting better, which is great, except what that means, just like in humans, is that now we see more of these neurodegenerative type diseases. As we treat other diseases really well, we now have to treat the brain. So as I was encountering it more and more, that was sort of exactly the same time that Julie came to me and said, “Hey, could we study this in dogs?” I was like, “Yes, we can study this in dogs because we have to.” So yeah, it just kind of took off from there.

Amy Parsons: You’re collaborating not just with each other and other scientists at College of Vet Med and Biomedical Sciences, but across the country, right?

Stephanie McGrath: Yes.

Julie Moreno: Mm-hmm.

Stephanie McGrath: So talk about what that means for that national collaboration that you’re leading.

Julie Moreno: I mean, I think it’s essential for the whole study to even work, because you can’t be an expert at everything, right? So you have to know when you’re like, “I don’t know how to look at this correctly. I need to go find someone that can.” So I think collaborations are key to all of this. And then also, working with people that you enjoy to work with is really important. So I think we’re both lucky because all of our collaborators, we get along really well, and we can ask questions, challenge each other, be skeptics, which is a really important part of science, is to make sure you are addressing it in all ways that you possibly can. I think we can do that with those collaborators, which is nice.

Amy Parsons: Yeah, yeah.

Stephanie McGrath: I mean, it’s a very complex disease, right? I mean, there’s so many different… Not only just the mechanism of disease, but why does it happen? What are the factors that contribute to it? What happens during the disease? How can we possibly prevent or intervene in the disease? So there’s so many different factors that probably need to be understood in dogs in order to even start understanding it in humans. So I think, like Julie said, finding experts to answer each of those million questions is critical. I mean, a hundred percent, we couldn’t do it alone. I think we feel very strongly and very passionately that we have to have this very large network of collaborators and scientists to make any real progress in advancing, accelerating our understanding of the disease.

Amy Parsons: When it comes to dogs, I just have to ask because there’s such a wide variety of dog breeds and dogs, a lot types. So how does that impact the study, just because dogs are so different? My dog is so different from your dog both in the study.

Julie Moreno: Right.

Amy Parsons: How does that impact how you test the dogs and the outcome of the research?

Stephanie McGrath: Well, it’s a fantastic question, and I think the short answer is that it requires a lot of dogs because there’s so much variety. So anytime you move away from a genetically identical animal that is in a climate-controlled, food-controlled environment like a mouse to this, requires a lot. So the more information we can gather, the better, so that we can start understanding breed differences, and all of weight and obesity and all of the different factors that we see in the dog population.

But I think on a positive note, to make my story longer, is that they mimic humans in a much more appropriate way as far as translational research. Again, the rodent models are incredibly important for other work and to understand the mechanism of disease. But in order to understand the actual naturally occurring changes in a diverse population, you need a diverse cohort of animals. So I think that sort of parallel to the human population is actually incredibly important and what makes them a great model to study.

Amy Parsons: Yeah, yeah. Are you finding, as you go through this study, that it’s going to also help owners, companions of dogs, care for dogs who might be experiencing some kind of dementia or later in life, and how we might give them the best life? And I think a corollary to that too is, has it changed the way that you see your own aging brain health at a human level, given what you know that we’re finding in these studies?

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah, I can answer from the dog perspective. I think yes, that’s the goal. Of course, as a veterinarian, my first and foremost hope and goal is to be able to treat these guys and to be able to offer the companion dog as well as the family more options, and be able to help them work through these geriatric years that many of us are lucky enough to encounter. So that’s definitely, from a veterinary perspective, that’s obviously the goal for me. I think maybe from a human perspective?

Julie Moreno: I mean, I think that the more we can… For me, specifically, I think knowing more about how our outside environment can affect our brain and how it ages is really important, and something that I keep thinking about. I have two young children going out and playing outside when there’s a wildfire. Maybe it’s far away, but there’s smoke everywhere, right? You might not want to go outside and be exposed to all those things. Or sometimes you drive down to a big city and you can see the pollution almost. You know?

Amy Parsons: Yeah.

Julie Moreno: I think being mindful of those things and the type of exposures that we’re exposed to. You can avoid it in some cases, but just knowing that sometimes it’s better not to play outside and have your windows open at certain times of the year. I think we have a lot more to study and understand on that. But I think that’s a thing that we can learn from our dog studies too, because they also are exposed to all of that.

Amy Parsons: Yeah, interesting.

Julie Moreno: It’s something that we can’t do in the lab, right?

Amy Parsons: Yeah, absolutely.

Julie Moreno: Mm-hmm.

Amy Parsons: Let’s talk a bit about student interaction with the study, because you’re both known for working closely with students and helping to mentor the next generation of scientists and veterinarians. Obviously, as a research institution overall at CSU, student success is very important to us, giving students that hands-on experience to be in the lab. So talk a little bit about how you’re working with students currently and how students might get involved in hands-on research like this.

Julie Moreno: Yeah. One of my passions is educating the next generation, honestly. I say that kind of giggling, but it’s so true. I started as an undergrad, working in a research lab, and I think I just see the value of that. I think that our students are the reason that we have all the data that we have. So we’re able to, of course, keep the samples from the team, but my team couldn’t from the clinical team. But my team is made up of students of undergraduate and graduate students, as well as resident DVMs and PhD students. We just have a variety of different students at different levels that work on our project together. And I think that that allows us to study different parts of the disease more efficiently.

So being able to have DVM PhD students work on certain parts that are more clinical, and then having undergrads be able to help the grad students, even do things like label tubes and do the easy parts of the experiment, are so vital to us being able to get the data and then be able to go talk about the data, write papers about the data, be able to tell our community members that we’re able to analyze the data. Your dog is in our study. It’s awesome because now we know this about the disease, and I really think that without those students, we just wouldn’t be as efficient, to be honest. They’re a big part of our teams.

Stephanie McGrath: Yeah. I agree with everything. I think to add onto that, what’s really fun about forming this network of neuroscientists and clinicians at CSU, and what we created as a brain research center, is that they’re able to see all the different parts. So it’s amazing how many times clinician, clinical students, or residents, or PhD students even, will say, “I really am curious, when we send them the brain, what happens.” The cool part is then they can go, and they do, spend time with Julie and her team, and learn how to do all of these special stains and analysis and vice versa.

Julie Moreno: For sure.

Stephanie McGrath: So her students come to the clinical side, and they’re like, “Oh, these are the dogs, these are the pet owners, these are the families.” They get to go to the MRI and watch it, and help with spinal taps and do all the things that we do. So I think we offer kind of a unique perspective. We feel like there’s no better way to do the science than to collaborate with each other and others. But I think exposing the students to that is really cool because they’re able to see all the sides of it, right?

Amy Parsons: Yeah. It’s such a win-win, right?

Julie Moreno: Yeah, definitely.

Amy Parsons: They’re providing this valuable perspective, that they’re getting that hands-on experience to see if this is their path. That’s something that’s great, not just about CVMBS, Vet Med, and this research study, but about CSU and the undergraduate experience at a research institution that you don’t get at other places.

Julie Moreno: Right, right.

Amy Parsons: It’s such part of the value proposition all the way around. So thank you for what you do with students. We typically end these conversations with advice from you all for students who are maybe just getting started on this path of looking to be research scientists or veterinarians. What advice can you share with new students who are just starting their journey?

Stephanie McGrath: I can start.

Julie Moreno: Okay.

Stephanie McGrath: My advice is to try it all. Try it all now while you’re a student, because I didn’t. I knew I didn’t want to do research 100%, and look at where I am.

Amy Parsons: Yeah.

Stephanie McGrath: So I would advise students to, even if they don’t think that that’s… I mean, almost more so for the non-research students, to try it. They may not like it, but now is the time when you have great mentors and this great environment to really try it all and try different things. So take advantage of all these different opportunities both on campus and off campus, right? I mean, there’s so much that… People love giving money and opportunities to students; they don’t to us. So now is the time to just try it.

Amy Parsons: Yeah, that’s a great advice.

Julie Moreno: That’s a really good point.

Amy Parsons: Yeah. Julie?

Julie Moreno: My biggest advice to students is to try it, but also be brave when you’re… So I feel like when you first start your freshman, sophomore year, you feel kind of timid about wanting to go up to a professor and ask them, “Can I be in your lab? And I was there.” It is very scary, right? But try to be brave and just send the email. Most of us get way too many emails, so send the email, send another, go to their office. Another good, I think, tip or trick is to, if you have an instructor that you’re really… Go to your instructor, they might talk about they might know someone that does a certain type of research that you like or you might be interested in. Sometimes they can send the email, saying, “Hey, colleague down the hall, I had this really great student.”

So I think getting into a research lab if you can as early as possible is so important. Not that you’re ever too late, but don’t feel like you need to know a bunch of things before you go. Most people across campus that want undergrads, which is a lot of people that want undergrads in their lab, they like it when you start when you’re a freshman or sophomore, because then, hopefully you’ll stay and get really good, and have your own branch of a project and do some really great things. So be brave, I guess, is what I-

Amy Parsons: That’s great advice. That’s really great advice. It’s good perspective to know too that they want undergraduates in the labs. Right?

Julie Moreno: We do. Yeah.

Amy Parsons: So just start out as freshman and sophomore and learn as you go.

Julie Moreno: Exactly.

Amy Parsons: Yeah. So that’s great advice. Well, you talk about being brave. I think you both are extraordinarily brave. We’re obviously so proud of you and the work that you’re doing. This is world-class, and we have one of the best programs in the country, and are just so proud of the work that you’re leading. It’s getting the national attention that it deserves. I know that really impactful things are going to come of it. So thanks for spending the time. Thanks for allowing our family and El Jefe to play a small role in the research. We’re proud of him and his big job. It’s really helped us just so much, even more appreciate the work that you all do and the work that happens at Colorado State University in this space.

Stephanie McGrath: Well, thank you, Amy.

Julie Moreno: Thank you.

Stephanie McGrath: It’s a privilege to be here.

Julie Moreno: Yeah, definitely, amazing. Thank you.

Stephanie McGrath: You’re doing the work that we do, and thanks for your support.

Amy Parsons: Absolutely. Thank you both.

Julie Moreno: Thank you. Thank you.

Amy Parsons: All right, that’s a wrap. Go Rams!

Stephanie McGrath: Go Rams!

Julie Moreno: Go Rams!

Amy Parsons: Thank you for listening. I’m Amy Parsons, president of Colorado State University, and you are listening to CSU’s The Next 150, where we explore what comes next for CSU by chatting with change makers who are already leading the charge and shaping our next 150 years. I’m gathering their very best advice for today’s CSU students. Stay tuned to wherever you get podcasts for our next outstanding conversation. Go Rams!