For decades, Kris and Mark McKinney dedicated themselves to nonprofit work. Kris served on several boards and had a special interest in mental health, especially for young women. Though Mark and Kris raised their own daughters to have confidence and wisdom to start life, they found many young women are facing challenges and lack of confidence as they enter adulthood. During one high school program that Kris and Mark supported, they polled the mixed group and found that few girls envisioned going to college.
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“They had no vision of their future,” Mark says. “It was like the girls were just drifting along.”
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When Kris served on the Texoma Community Foundation Board she was proud to see the success of the Girls on the Run national program in Oklahoma. Kris thought highly of the program and she and Mark committed to the program’s success in Grayson County. It all came together when she and the TCF team discovered the Girls on the Run – DFW. The organization served Grayson County but did not yet have a presence here.
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As the pieces came together, Kris dreamed, and gave feedback to the TCF team while she was facing cancer. She passed before the program launched, but her longstanding dedication to the Texoma Community Foundation, her passion for the Smith Foundation, love of Reba, and devotion to Austin College made the project move smoothly forward as these entities came together.
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“She would have been so proud,” said Nicole Thornhill – TCF’s Texoma Giving Partners Director.
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Female college students soon agreed to serve as coaches to the third through fifth graders in the program. They met twice a week to prepare for their 5K run. Along the way, they built confidence in their abilities, learned how to develop relationships, and how to finish what they set out to do.
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In May 2025, the girls did just that with a 5K run in Plano. All showed up and ran or walked—some needed to take their time. But they finished.
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“It was an activity that gave them something to do and something to accomplish,” Mark says. “It's not just go out and run. The program is really trying to teach the kids to have mental self-confidence.”
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Mark recalled how when he and Kris were presented the age group, it was younger than they had envisioned supporting. But now, Mark feels they reached girls at the right age.
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“By the time life gets complicated in high school, you have hopefully given them a basis for having self-confidence,” Mark says. “Hopefully we’re affecting lives in a positive way, and they will reach a potential they might not have.”
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Partnered with TCF and Austin College, Mark hopes the Girls on the Run program will continue and grow after this first year.
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He says, “I think Kris would have been very pleased with how it turned out.”

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