The Southwest Voice

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“The mission of America's Junior Miss is to emphasize education by providing scholarship opportunities to outstanding, college-bound high school girls, and to encourage personal development in all young people.”    http://www.ajm.org/about/

Four Kern County young ladies: Brittany Lopez, Delano; Bethany Feil, Bakersfield; Cheyanne Gustason, Tehachapi; and Laura Arnold, Shafter; are in Rohnert Park, California this week having a memorable time participating in the State level of America's Junior Miss scholarship program.  These young ladies represent what is good and admirable in our youth today. 

The participants will be judged in 5 categories: Scholastic (20%), Judges Interview (25%), Talent (25%), Fitness (15%) and Self-Expression (15%).  This competition is broken into three evening events.  August 9th & 10th will be preliminary judging events where the girls are judged throughout the evening after performing as a group in a high energy fitness/stamina routine,  presenting their unique talent, and then expressing themselves in long dresses to show their poise, gracefulness and ability to answer a question on the spot!  The Scholastic judging and Judges Interview take place prior to the evening events.  On Saturday, August 11th, ten finalist will be announced and from that ten, a new California Junior Miss will be selected.  The California Junior Miss would then compete the following June in the National program in Mobile, Alabama.  Each level of the program offers a greater potential for scholarships as well as life time friendships.

Former participants, although hoping for scholarships, admit that their greatest joy was the friendships made and the memories that the experience itself brought to their lives.