This past weekend, Serene Singh, a Sikh and South Asian 23-year-old from Colorado Springs, Colorado placed in the TOP 10 for Miss World America, the world’s largest and oldest pageant competition. Singh is also a former America’s Junior Miss as well as Miss Colorado Teen.
As a part of the Miss World America competition, Serene submitted tens of videos, statements, and photos. After Singh won the Miss Colorado title, she engaged in interview, fitness, talent, photogenic, entrepreneur, influencer, Q/A, head-to-head, among other competitions to land her a spot in the prestigious Top 10 in the USA.
After many years of the Miss World America competition without Colorado placing, Singh is “so grateful and excited†to have represented her home state this year and to be bringing home a special honor this 2020 year. Former Miss World America’s have included Halle Berry and former Miss USA Olivia Jordan.
“Pageantry for me has been an opportunity to meet like-minded women who care deeply about being multi-disciplined in life, serving a greater purpose than themselves, and representing the culture and communities I carry with me so that someone out there is inspired to do the same in their field or with their dreams – even if it has never been done before,†explains Singh.
Singh is a Rhodes Scholar and Truman Scholar who attended the University of Colorado where she obtained Latin Honors in her degrees in Political Science and Journalism. Currently, Singh is a Doctoral student at the University of Oxford, research focusing on the treatment of women in the United States criminal justice system.
Her focus on women and girls extends beyond her research and according to her, is the same reason she competes in pageantry. As a former intern for Mrs. Obama’s Global Girls Alliance as well as the Founder of The Serenity Project, a nonprofit that works with women survivors across the U.S. to build confidence tools and mentorship, Singh is deeply passionate about bringing awareness to women’s issues as well as advocating for women’s rights. She is also working on a project in Jharkhand, India to help Indian adolescent village girls gain self-defense skills and resources to stay in school.
“In fact, I started my nonprofit with the knowledge I gained from my very first pageant title. I promised myself when I started competing to give all I am given back so more girls out there have opportunities like the ones I have had in my life to reach where I am today,†Singh says.
Bangalore is a physicist, actor and the founder of Operation Period, a youth-led nonprofit addressing menstrual inequity through art, advocacy, education, community engagement and aid.
She received her physics degree and math minor from the University of Oregon in 2018 and is now pursuing her M.S. in aerospace engineering with a concentration on propulsion systems, it said.
She has worked at two NASA centers, Marshall Space Flight Center and Johnson Space Center, on propulsion and the cockpit displays for the Orion spacecraft, as well as in the White House under President Obama on science policy.
Saaraswat immigrated to the United States when she was three years old. She has since moved around seven times and has attended over 10 different schools, according to her bio.
Because she was moving around a lot, her family became her best friends – and remain so today. Both of her parents are physicians and from a young age, Saaraswat was encouraged to lead a service driven life. At 14, she began volunteering in the neonatal intensive care unit at a local hospital. It was here where she found her love for pediatrics and medicine, her bio said.
She entered Bucknell University on a presidential fellowship, which is the highest merit scholarship the university offers. Her academic endeavors led her to a stem cell internship at Harvard University, four publications in medical journals, and a life-changing trip to volunteer and intern at a local hospital in India, the bio notes.
Currently, she is pursuing a master of science of health policy and economics at Weill Cornell Medicine before she enters medical school.
Saini is a global speaker who has been invited to speak in over eight countries and 30 states, her bio touts.
She graduated from the University of Washington and has been a visiting student at Harvard, Stanford and Yale universities.
Saini has devoted her life to community service. At age 15, she started her nonprofit and since then, she has written thousands of articles and served hundreds of nonprofits, it said.
Her impact has reached millions: earning her the “Best Pageant Titleholder†award and recognitions from the Secretary of State, Senate, Governor and American Heart Association CEO.
Saini’s childhood dream to serve as Miss World inspired her to change her adversities to advocacy. She is a survivor of bullying, facial burns and heart defect.
At just age 12, she got a pacemaker surgery to keep her alive. Doctors said her physical activities would be forever limited but Shree persevered to regain her lost physical and emotional strength, the bio said.
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