Katy Benoit

Established in 1889 under a land grant, the University of Idaho was placed in the town of Moscow as a peace offering by then Governor Edward Stevenson.

I heard you go, hmm.

I've just never heard that before, a peace offering.

What year was that? I'm sorry.

Yeah, it was 1889.

And why a peace offering, you might ask? Well, apparently the panhandle part of the state had almost successfully removed itself from Idaho to become part of Washington.

But Governor Stevenson blocked the bill.

And this made a lot of people angry.

So his consolation prize to the people of Idaho was a strategic placement of the state's only university.

The school officially opened in 1892 with 40 students.

Since then, it's expanded to accommodate over 11,000 students on its main Moscow campus, as well as 1,000 other students over several satellite locations, including Boise, Idaho Falls, Twin Falls, and Post Falls.

They are also an R1 research facility, as well as an NCAA D1 school that participates in the Big Sky Conference.

But one of the things they're most known for is their commitment to service learning and civic engagement.

In 2010, they were named on the president's higher education community service honor roll for exemplary service efforts,

with over 3,800 students

providing 150,000 hours of community and service learning.

For a young, service-minded woman named Katie Benoit, this was exactly the kind of school she was looking for.

Born and raised in Boise, Idaho, Catherine, who went by Katie, grew up in a loving home with her parents and her brother.

Her family described her as always being innately kind, smart, and fun, and that she had a passion for learning about others.

This led her to make friends quickly, and as she grew, her mother said that one of Katie's greatest gifts was being able to connect with anyone.

She was also extremely musically talented from a young age.

So Katie began piano lessons in preschool, and by age

five, she was also playing the fiddle.

I've heard that learning the piano first is one of the best things that you can teach your child because they learn to read all music then.

Are you going to teach Hannah? I've given it consideration as well.