This group of students distinguished themselves by performing acts of service in October, earning the coveted title of Student of the Month for their Hall

Hinckley Hall - Brooke Stevenson

Brooke Stevenson hails from San Marcos California, near San Diego California. As a student of Brigham Young University, Brooke excels academically. She is currently considering a major in elementary education. In addition to her studies, Brooke acts as a Visiting Teaching specialist in the

      17^th chapter of the Relief Society auxiliary at Brigham Young University, In this capacity, Brooke manages and coordinates visiting teaching within her chapter: a service program that seeks to talk and serve all 40 girls in her chapter. Brooke recently won fourth place in her age group at the St. George Marathon.  Brooke has never run on a team or with an organization. She decided that she wanted to run a marathon for herself. Brooke started training to run near the end of the summer. She began by running a few miles a day working up to running up to twenty miles everyday. She gradually worked her way up to a full twenty-six miles in a marathon. This past month, Brooke competed in her first marathon ever. She not only was able to run the full twenty-six miles, but she also won 4^th place out of hundreds of other people her age. Brooke’s determination to run in a marathon paid off and we are all very proud of her.

David John Hall - Whitney Cude

In the month of October, Whitney Cude has served diligently as the David John Hall President.  She has worked hard to balance her responsibilities for the Helaman Halls Housing Area Council (Area) and David John Hall Council.  Through Whitney’s responsibilities, she has increased the school spirit on campus and the spirit of Halloween within the resident in her hall and the children in the community.

During the month of October, Whitney has been involved in planning and implementing a variety of programs for the Area.  Whitney exemplified true loyalty to Brigham Young University (BYU) by strongly supporting the BYU Spirit Week sponsored by the Area.  She showed her peer residents what school spirit looks like by putting on Cougar blue and singing the fight song in the crowded cafeteria.  Whitney hoped that she could help her fellow freshmen learn the words to the fight song by being an example as well as giving the freshmen as much exposure to the words of the fight song as possible.  Whitney has heavily contributed to the heighten BYU school spirit and knowledge of the fight song by being an example and spending the time to teach the fight song.

Whitney also assisted the David John Hall Council in helping the residents of David John Hall to bring the Halloween spirit to the hall.  Whitney supported the Halloween door decorating program by planning the program, decorating her own door, and judging the different doors.  Whitney took the time to assist in planning by contributing ideas for prizes and helping to coordinate between the Hall and Area programs.  Whitney was also a great example for the hall because she took the time to decorate her own door.  She also spent time judging each door individually and appreciating all the residents that participated. 

Whitney also helped to bring in the Halloween spirit by starting an anonymous boo program in our hall.  Whitney chose two rooms in David John and recognized them by giving them some candy and placing a ghost on the door.  Whitney hoped that by starting these random and anonymous acts of kindness that they would pass it on to others.  The hall did continue to pass on the ghosts and the hall grew closer together as a community because of Whitney dedicating her time and service as Hall President.

Also during the month of October, Whitney served the community of Provo.  She worked with the area and hall councils to provide a safe and warm place for the children that live in the Wymount Family Housing Area to come and trick-or-treat in David John Hall.  Whitney encouraged fellow residents to pass out candy and also encouraged the hall council to buy candy to pass out to the children.

Through Whitney’s effort in the Area and Hall councils, she has increased the BYU spirit on campus and has also increased the spirit of Halloween within the resident in David John hall and the children within the community.

Taylor Hall - Miriam Carrillo

In the month of October Miriam Carillo showed her love, kindness, leadership as she donated blood for the first time. For some this might be no big deal but for Miriam this was a scary thing. When she donated she brought many friends along with her telling them that this is what they needed to be doing and to think of the lives they might be saving. Putting her nervousness aside she led the way and showed no fear. If you asked her she might have said differently but through her excitement and cheerfulness she included many people and got them excited about this little act of love and kindness that would be helping someone’s live in one way or another. From this little act she has motivated many from her hall to donate blood on a regular basis. Her little act of kindness has not only helped a lucky individual but has shown an incredible example to her fellow classmates as well.

Throughout her life Miriam has dedicated herself to serving others. She is currently the floor president and is involved in many activities at Brigham Young University however her leadership didn’t start here. In high school she was involved in many clubs including: Key Club, Project Aware, Spanish Club, Health Sciences Students of America (HOSA), and many more serving various positions from President all the way down to representative. She is a stand out everywhere she is always putting a smile on someone face, cheering someone up who’s had a rough week, and being a great listener when you need to just talk it out.

Her example to the floor and hall where she lives will be always be light and example to follow. As she leads us every month her smile never fades and her light never fades. Her outstanding achievements will forever be embedded in lives she has been around and her example is supreme.

Stover Hall - Sean Lyman

Sean Lyman is an open major freshman from Brigham City, Utah. Sean is deserves this award because of how he helped out my program proposal for IACURH. What happened was for our program we needed to film some videos to go along with what we were trying to say. I  knew that he had a camera so I went and asked him if we could borrow it. Not only did he let us use it, but he also volunteered to film for us. Doing this he took a few hours out of his time when he could have been studying or talking to his girl friend. I just think that it is awesome to be able to know an individual who cares about others and is willing to help out where he can.

Budge Hall - Carter Elton

This month, the 3200 floor of Budge Hall decided to do a service project. They wanted to take a Saturday out of their time to give something back to the community, as well as have the opportunity to just get to know each other. However, this was as far as they got as a floor. Nothing else was planned, or else not initiative. This did not satisfy resident Carter Elton. Carter is on the 3200 floor council, and took it upon himself, without any incentive from anyone else, to organize the service project. When he saw that nobody else was going to get anything done about it, Carter went to the Service and Learning Center on his own time and organized a project for his floor and another floor coupled with his to do. Once the project was organized, Carter then took it a step further and took the responsibility of the publicity on himself as well. Carter made sure that flyers were posted so that everyone involved knew about the activity. And as if that wasn't enough, Carter went above and beyond what he had already accomplished, and on the day of the activity, he woke up extra early to go around knocking on people's doors to do them the courtesy of waking them up in time for the activity. And on top of all this, Carter stayed behind at the start of the activity to assist anyone who needed help getting to the activity who was running behind.

Through all of his noble efforts Carter Elton shaped this service activity into what it turned out to be. It never would have happened if it wasn't for him, although he was no more responsible for the outcome of the project than anyone else on the floor council was. This is why I am nominating Carter Elton for the October 2007 resident of the month.

Merrill Hall - Chad Marler

Freshman Chad Marler currently serves as the 2100 Floor President of Merrill Hall in the Helaman Halls student housing at Brigham Young University. Chad was nominated by his Floor Vice President, Brian Thacker, to receive the Student of the Month Award for the month of October. Chad has been dedicating much of his time this past month to serving his fellow floor-mates. During the October cleaning checks, Chad was helping several of his floor-mates to clean up their rooms in time so that they would pass the cleaning checks and avoid getting a bad mark on their housing record. He’s also been known to help his floor-mates out by loaning them some of his laundry detergent or shampoo, or even just buying them a bottle if they’re short on money.

I asked Chad why he chooses to serve his floor-mates; he simply responded by saying, “It’s a great blessing to me to be able to serve them.” Brian Thacker, the one who originally nominated Chad for the Student of the Month award said that “Chad is always just out helping people.”

Chad is from Goodrich, Michigan and is currently studying Nutritional Science at Brigham Young University. Chad is thinking of becoming a cardiologist. He’s been considering this career ever since he, himself, experienced some heart problems in high school (don’t worry, he’s all better now). Just by looking at Chad, you can tell he loves playing sports. Chad is always wearing athletic shorts and shoes. He loves to run and play basketball. “Running is just a big stress reliever for me. I love it,” says Chad. He also plays the piano and enjoys putting large jig-saw puzzles together.

May Hall - Daniel Merkley

Daniel Merkley, a Freshman here at Brigham young University, is the perfect example of what a college student should strive for. He balances the stress and work of a college student's life with the demands of the social life of that of a young man loved by all. Though it may seem like a simple task, any college student will tell you otherwise. Daniel is heading into an Accounting major and is currently taking classes preparing him for that, classes in which he is surpassing all expectations and demands. He goes above and beyond in every aspect of his academic and social life. Along with his exemplory student atributes, Daniel exemplfies a true friend. He knows what is going on with all of his friends and knows exactly how to help them. In the month of October, he portrayed both amazing characteristics while being a beacon of light to his friends in a class that seemed to be an endless tunnel of darkness. He was willing to put down whatever he may have been doing to help out any person on our floor with questions from that class. The most important and impressive aspect of these acts was not that he was helping out, it was that the reason he was helping out was due to the fact that he did so in the hope that the person would achieve greatness. It was not that he may receive glory for helping and any type of credit. It was because he genuinly wanted them to succeed.