“At the end of the day, it was a huge success, and it paid off,” said Miss NKU Kandice Williams. “All the hard work, late nights of walking in my basement with my dresses on to make sure my walk was perfect. Practicing my talent tumbling with a hurt shoulder from nationals this past season and being in pain because my shoulder hurts so bad. Competing with a rash from my KT tape. I was just knocked down again and again, and it was nice to finally see all the hard work pay off.”
Williams was crowned the second-ever Miss NKU, a program that started in October 2022 as a local preliminary under Miss America and ran as a student organization at Northern Kentucky University. The winner of the Miss NKU pageant goes on to compete for Miss Kentucky; should they win, they would compete in Miss America.
“She’s (Williams) the perfect leader,” Local Director of Miss NKU Scholarship Pageant Chelsea Benton said. “She’s a cheerleader on campus, so she has good morale. She’s very passionate about the school. She’s a graduate of the university, and she’s attending our graduate program, so she has leadership capabilities already.”
Not only is Williams an NKU cheerleader, but she is also a full-time second-grade teacher at River Ridge Elementary in Villa Hills. She graduated from NKU in the spring of 2023 with a bachelor’s in elementary education. She is currently pursuing her master’s in the Teacher as Leader Program with an endorsement in gifted and talented.
“For every one student who was admitted into an after-school program, there are four waiting to get in, which leaves over 280,000 Kentucky kids without care or programing or just a safe place to be after school.” Kandice Williams
Because the program is still new, Benton said they are still working on their goals for the program, which include Miss NKU acting as the face of the school and being seen as a school leader.
Participants must be NKU undergraduate or graduate students because a scholarship is attached for winners. There is a small application requirement based on Miss America eligibility, and the students must be in good academic and social conduct standing. No pageant experience is required.
Williams was awarded a $500 scholarship for her win.
“We’re trying to partner with the university right now, especially with our new president, to see what kind of opportunities can open up because it’s still fairly new,” Benton said. “Right now, there are speaking engagements and community service opportunities that she’ll get to help bring in enrollment for the university.”
Though Williams said she was only super involved in pageantry recently, her heavy involvement in competitive cheer drives her to compete. Williams competed in the first Miss NKU pageant in 2022 but lost.
“I didn’t win the title, and I knew that I wanted to compete at Miss Kentucky, not only because I knew that I put in a lot of work into the Miss NKU but because each contestant has to create a community service initiative, and I had created mine and I’ve kind of resonated with it and did a lot of research on it and became attached to it,” Williams said. “I didn’t want all that hard work to go to waste.”
The pageant includes a 10-minute interview between the candidate and judges about the community service initiative they chose—another pageant requirement. After the opening number for introductions, the athletic wear portion shows a candidate’s physical fitness. They must purchase clothes to match the theme—this year, it was red for heart cancer. That is followed by a talent portion and onstage conversations regarding their community service and student leadership. The pageant ends with an evening wear walk.
Williams won overall for evening wear and talent—which she did cheerleading for.
Williams’s effort in her community service initiative, “R.I.S.E. Up for After School,” stems from her love of being an educator. The program aims to advocate for the affordability and accessibility of after-school programs.
“For every one student who was admitted into an after-school program, there are four waiting to get in, which leaves over 280,000 Kentucky kids without care or programing or just a safe place to be after school,” Williams said.
Refine: How can the state refine after-school programs, and how can after-school programs refine a child’s life?
Invest: Williams said after-school programs invest in children’s lives, allowing them to have somewhere safe to go and make a child feel like they’re cared about. Invest also stands for investing money into after-school programs.
Serve: Williams said after-school programs are shutting their doors daily because they don’t have people to go in and volunteer.
Equip: How can a community equip its after-school programs?
R.I.S.E stands for refine, invest, serve, equip.
“I’ve had the chance to create ‘days of service,’” Williams said. “I had my first one last May, and I’m planning to have another one this May at John G. Carlisle Elementary in Covington, where I had volunteers come in, and yes, it was my first year, and I had my mom, my stepdad and two of my friends there but my goal is to make this across the entire commonwealth where I can get volunteers from corner to corner from Pikesville to Owensboro.”
Williams said her community service initiative is just ensuring kids are safe.
“At the end of the day, our Kentucky kids are the future of our state,” she said. “They’re going to be our future leaders, our future teachers, our future nurses, and we need to do everything to protect them.”
Williams said she hopes the program will become a nonprofit within the next year.
Something that rivals Williams’s love for education is her love for NKU.
She started her college career in Bowling Green and then eventually tried the Disney College program, but enrolling at NKU, Williams said, allowed her to be the student she always knew she wanted to be. It also allowed her to get back into her love for cheerleading.
“It’s just so surreal to be Miss NKU because I owe where I’m at today to that university, and I’m just so prideful to be a Norse through and through like my skin literally bleeds black and yellow, and I don’t even like those colors that much,” Williams said.
Because of that Norse pride, Benton said Williams would help the Miss NKU program reach its goal of transforming the program into more than a pageant.
“She’s (Williams) going to be the person that bridges the gap this year on bringing that buy-in from the university, and I’m pretty sure she’s going to be very successful and partner with different organizations on campus to really bring this pageant into the forefront,” Benton said.
Benton said the program is done through all volunteers.
“We don’t get paid to do these local preliminaries,” she said. “These young ladies are college students, so to get to the state, there are a lot of fees involved to prepare for these opportunities.”
Benton said anyone who would like to sponsor a pageant winner or if they want to get involved in any way can contact her at missnkupageant@gmail.com.
