“Fasting won’t get water to the lake,” says organizer, but heightened awareness and further action can help.
Provo • A newly formed coalition on Brigham Young University’s campus is using faith to fight the drought plaguing the Great Salt Lake.
The BYU Great Salt Lake Student Coalition is putting together a campuswide fast to spread environmental awareness about Utah’s water-starved natural wonder.
BYU student Katie Dunn, the coalition’s founder, said the purpose of the organization is to give students all across campus the opportunity to fight for the future of the Great Salt Lake.
Dunn said she never had anticipated that she would advocate for environmental issues.
“I watched a documentary about a different environmental issue in a city far away, and I was like, ‘Wow, I care about environmental issues. I would never let something like that happen in my backyard,’” Dunn said. “Then I had this moment, like, ‘Katie, what are you doing? This sort of stuff is happening in your own city.’”
After this experience, Dunn began collaborating with other nonprofit organizations — such as Grow the Flow, headed by BYU ecologist Ben Abbott, and in which she serves as a project manager — in order to bring awareness on campus about the lake’s plight. On Sept. 24, the coalition had its first meeting and more than 60 students attended.
(Katie Dunn) Students and Latter-day Saints attend a meeting hosted by the BYU Student Great Salt Lake Coalition on Brigham Young University’s campus on Wednesday, Sept. 24, 2025.
About the fast
For the coalition’s first event, members are staging a campuswide fast Nov. 16 for BYU students and other Latter-day Saints. (Fasting is a Latter-day Saint practice in which participants do not eat or drink for periods of time in exchange for spiritual blessings.)
This fast is meant not only for spiritual blessings but also to help bring education and raise awareness about the crisis at Utah’s largest lake.
In addition to the fast, the coalition will host a virtual devotional. Speakers have yet to be determined.
Dunn said she hopes people will come to understand that the health of the lake affects everyone.
“The fast itself is not the fix,” Dunn said. “Fasting won’t get water to the lake. But I’m hoping that this makes people feel a little more responsible. And then it can connect them with nonprofit organizations and students’ research projects that will make measurable differences.”
‘Every drop of water counts’
Coalition members are busy contacting all of BYU’s clubs and organizations to publicize the event.
Maycen Robinson, for instance, is tasked with reaching out to various groups across campus.
“Our goal is to show everybody that it really impacts everybody,” Robinson said. “We want to work with the ski club to show them how it impacts the snowpack. We want to work with the running club because if the lake dries up, that impacts respiratory health.”
Robinson said the coalition isn’t necessarily trying to attract people who already know of the threatened lake. They are pushing instead to broaden that base and educate people across campus about the stakes if the lake dries up.
Robinson grew up near the lake and yearns to preserve the Salt Lake Valley’s namesake geographic feature.
“Every little bit counts. Every drop of water counts. Every person that is involved counts,” Robinson said. “It was just part of my life growing up, and it would make me so sad to know that it’s gone and not there for future generations to enjoy.
