Two Utah Youth Honored for Volunteerism at National Award Ceremony in Washington, D.C.; Actor Ted Danson and Olympic Champion Joey Cheek Pay Tribute to Young Heroes as Part of Four-Day Recognition Events

Business Wire, May 8, 2006

WASHINGTON -- Two Utah students, Bradley Jencks, 15, of South Jordan and Lauren Hillman, 14, of Orem were honored in the nation's capital last night for their outstanding volunteer work during the presentation of The 2006 Prudential Spirit of Community Awards. The two young people - along with 100 other top youth volunteers from across the country - received $1,000 awards as well as personal congratulations from actor Ted Danson and Olympic speedskating champion Joey Cheek at the 11th annual award ceremony and gala dinner reception, held at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History.

Brad and Lauren were named the top high school and middle level youth volunteers in Utah in February. In addition to their cash awards, they received engraved silver medallions and an all-expense-paid trip to Washington, D.C., for this week's recognition events.

Conducted in partnership with the National Association of Secondary School Principals (NASSP), The Prudential Spirit of Community Awards were created 11 years ago by Prudential Financial, Inc. to encourage youth volunteerism and to identify and reward young role models. Since then, the program has honored more than 70,000 young volunteers at the local, state and national level.

"Brad and Lauren exemplify the spirit of community that is so important to the future of our neighborhoods, our towns and our nation," said Arthur F. Ryan, chairman and CEO of Prudential. "By honoring them, we hope not only to give them the recognition they so richly deserve, but also to inspire others to follow their example."

Brad, a ninth-grader at South Jordan Middle School, honored and preserved the memory of those buried in an old ghost-town cemetery by cleaning and restoring headstones, collecting information about more than 1,400 individual graves, and making the information available to the public through books and Web sites. When Brad accompanied his parents to the Bingham City Cemetery to gather information about nine ancestors buried there, he saw gravestones that were broken, vandalized or faded beyond recognition, as well as gravesites with no information at all. "It made me feel bad that these people have been forgotten about," he said. He also saw the headstones of young men from more than 30 countries who had come to Utah long ago to work in copper mines, but were too poor to be sent home for burial. He realized that most of their living descendants would not be able to get information about them, and thought he could help.

After receiving permission to work on the eight-acre cemetery, Brad asked local companies to donate new headstones and the supplies needed to clean up the graveyard, then recruited friends, family members and scout groups to pick up garbage, trim weeds, clean old headstones and install new ones. They spent 15 days gathering information from headstones, photographing unreadable stones, and mapping each grave using GPS technology. Brad also placed flyers on gravesites asking for information, and spent Memorial Day weekend at the cemetery interviewing visitors. In all, more than 250 volunteers spent thousands of hours helping Brad collect and compile all of the information, and his father helped him create a computer database to organize it. The data was then printed in six 1,500-page books, and provided to Utah State Historical Society and free Internet genealogy Web sites. "Because of this project, we were able to save and preserve history and cemetery records that would otherwise have been lost forever," said Brad.

Lauren, an eighth-grader at Lakeridge Junior High School, started a community service club at her school that has conducted a wide range of projects to benefit the elderly, hurricane victims, Mexican orphans, African refugees and others. Lauren comes from a family that has always emphasized volunteering, so when she asked friends one day to help her collect clothing for an orphanage in Mexico, she was surprised that they showed little interest. "That is when I realized that I needed my friends to get the vision of service," she said. "I wanted them to experience the joy that I had felt by doing service. I knew that if they did, they would become committed to helping others."

With help from her mother, Lauren crafted a mission statement for a school club, obtained permission from her principal, and asked businesses to become sponsors. Then she made flyers to recruit members and spread the word through friends and teachers. Although only three students showed up for the first few meetings, membership grew as the new club began working on projects. Since the clothing drive for the Mexican orphanage, Lauren and her fellow club members have purchased flowers for elderly women on Mother's Day, sponsored a special day at school to raise awareness about the Darfur crisis in Sudan, collected school supplies for victims of Hurricane Katrina, delivered painted pumpkins to a nursing home, and participated in other service activities. Lauren is already talking about starting another volunteer club once she gets to high school. "Service will always be a part of my life," she said.