The 2024 Utah Athletes in Service Award recognizes student-athletes with a demonstrated commitment to community engagement. As athletes, the University of Utah community of students, faculty, staff and alumni supports them. In turn, many of them give back to our community in various ways.

The Bennion Center for Community Engagement in collaboration with U of U Athletics will recognize two student-athletes during the first quarter of the Oct. 19 TCU vs. Utah football game. These student-athletes are Veronic Boire from Track & Field and Baylor Lewis from Swim & Dive.

“The Bennion Center celebrates and encourages community engagement across the campus. Seeing student-athletes integrate community engagement in their education experience at the U is remarkable,” said Bryce Williams, Bennion Center associate director for Student Engagement & Outreach. "Veronic's and Baylor’s commitment to engaging with their community exemplifies what it means to be leaders while in the pool or on the track, in the classroom and in the greater community.”

Baylor Lewis is a senior studying biology with a minor in nutrition. Lewis has also been selected to the honor roll on two different occasions in his career. Lewis' community engagement work has been through the U Fit Program, Veterans Age Golden Games and the Utah Tumbling Academy. Lewis said that through his community engagement work, he has been able to make human-to-human connections and see people for who they are.

Veronic Boire is a senior studying kinesiology with minors in business and psychology. Boire has been selected for the academic honor roll on three different occasions. Boire’s primary community engagement work has been through the University of Utah Hospital. Boire said her community engagement work at the hospital has allowed her to build skills around compassion, integrity, quality and trust.

The Bennion Center has been awarding the Utah Athletes in Service Award since 2015 and is very excited to welcome Veronic Boire and Baylor Lewis to the ranks of former Utah Athletes in Service Award winners. The Bennion Center connects students to finding their passion in community engagement work and offer engagement opportunities in a variety of different interest areas and levels of commitment.