With this title come both responsibility and rewards, including college scholarship money and the opportunity to represent Massachusetts in the Miss America pageant next year.
Elise Linscott, Emma Gilbert and Cherise Leclerc, from left, are the three local women who will be competing in the Miss Massachusetts Scholarship Pageant July 8 and 9.By CHRISTINA McCAUSLAND
cmccausland@repub.com
WORCESTER – Fifteen young women, including three with ties to Western Massachusetts, will compete for the Miss Massachusetts title in the Miss Massachusetts Scholarship Pageant at the Hanover Theatre for the Performing Arts on July 8-9.
With this title come both responsibility and rewards, including college scholarship money and the opportunity to represent Massachusetts in the Miss America pageant in January 2012.
The three local women talked about the upcoming pageant.
• Emma Gilbert, from Northampton and the current Miss Western Massachusetts, said that she has the butterflies but feels confident because she’s “doing it for all the right reasons.”
She competed in the Miss Massachusetts competition last summer as well, and said that she learned a lot from the young woman who won the crown, Loren Galler-Rabinowitz of Brookline. “I realized that you just have to be yourself. Each time I (compete) I feel more comfortable and confident.”
• Cherise Leclerc, who is from Hampden and is the reigning Miss Middlesex County, said that she had “the time of (her) life” in the first pageant she competed in.
“We’re friends. We help each other out,” she said of the relationships among the girls competing. Gilbert said that, during last year’s competition, they dubbed themselves the “Miss Mass sisterhood.”
• Elise Linscott of Williamsburg, the reigning Miss Greater Holyoke, is competing on a platform about the importance of the arts.
“I really try to better my community,” Linscott said. “My experience has been a great learning opportunity.”
In addition to providing opportunities for them to give back in ways that are important to them, the girls said that the pageants they’ve competed in so far have also proved to be invaluable experiences in public speaking and interviewing.
All 15 competitors in the Miss Massachusetts pageant have already won local titles. In these positions, the girls have been working with the Children’s Miracle Network Hospitals, a partner organization to the Miss America Program that raises funds for children’s hospitals, as well as volunteering in efforts to promote their personal platforms.
The pageants themselves consist of more than just the swimsuit and evening wear segments that most imagine.
Competitors must perform a talent and answer questions on-stage as well as in a personal interview, which takes place in front of only the judging panel. Questions for these sections can cover any topic, from politics to details about their personal platforms, and the girls said that they prepare by keeping up with the news and discussing current issues with friends.
Leclere noted that “pageants have a stigma ... people dismiss it as just walking in high heels.”
Gilbert agrees. “A lot of people think that pageants are really fake, but we’re the most genuine girls you’ll ever meet,” she said. “We’re doing it for scholarship money and to better ourselves.”
Viewers are invited to vote for their favorite contestant by giving a $1 donation at www.missmass.org .