Senior Grace Gebara was crowned Miss Fulton County this October. Gebara was also crowned Miss Northwest Georgia’s Outstanding Teen 2019 last year. She recently got into pageants last year.

“A friend’s mom had seen me perform and she had run one of the big local pageants called, Miss Capital Cities and she was like ‘Grace you seem like the type of person who would really want to do it,” stated Gebara. Ever since then, she fell fell in love with the pageant world and continued to do pageants.

She really had a passion to be Miss Fulton County, especially since it is where she lives. “I did a few preliminaries, but I always told my mom that I just want to be Miss Fulton County. I had known that going into it,” said Gebara.

The fact Gebara won Miss Fulton County at a young age is quite the accomplishment.  “It’s really hard for eighteen year old, seniors in high school to get titles because they are the youngest. A lot of times when the judges are looking for a title holder they are looking for someone who could hold the job of Miss Georgia and I would love to, but a lot of times Miss Georgia is older, so that carries over. Also, a lot of eighteen year old aren’t as mature,” explained Gebara. 

Her platform is called Kids Who Code, which Gebara is very passionate about.  “It is the hour of code. I bring that around to mostly younger kids. I talk to them and teach them coding. It’s not exactly what it seems, just like pageants aren’t what people think it is. Coding is creativity. It is only limited by your imagination, so I like to bring it to kids and demystify it for them. I show them that it can be fun,” said Gebara. 

Kids Who Code is very important for the computer science world. “Stem jobs are increasing more and more, but in the last year there were over 500,000 jobs available nationwide, and there were only 200,000 graduates of computer science to fill those jobs in America,” said Gebara.

Gebara especially loves sharing her platform with girls. “I’m all about every child doing it, but I love talking to girls because women in computer science are so underrepresented, so if you can get girls interested and teach them it’s not a man thing. It doesn’t matter who you are. It does not matter your gender. You can do this. You should not feel limited just because you are a girl. If you are interested in science and stem, that’s amazing,” said Gebara.

Gebara wants to break the stigma about pageants. “Miss America recently got rid of the swimsuit portion. It caused a lot of drama within the system, but personally I respect it because there is a stigma with it. I mean, when people think of pageants, they think of it as a beauty queen competition, so getting rid of the swimsuit portion was an awesome step, especially with the #metoo movement and with feminism on the rise,” stated Gebara. Pageants are more about what is on the side.

“What I like focusing on is that the Miss America system really focuses on your brain. The two biggest sections are interview and talent, and, yes, there is evening wear, but there is nowhere written in about how you look. It is all about confidence, does she command a room, is she the type of woman to look up to,” said Gebara.

The girls who participate in pageants are really nice to each other and encourage each other throughout the pageant. There is no hatefulness or sabotage. It is the complete opposite than what someone would think. “One night I did not have earrings for my fitness section and three of the girls jumped up and asked me if I wanted to use theirs,” said Gebara.

Gebara loves the girls who she has met from the pageant world. “It’s not a competition. It’s just about girls encouraging girls to be better,” said Gebara, “I encourage people to break the stigma about it and really look into it or talk to me. I’m really open to talking about pageants and if anyone’s interested I’m more than excited to talk to people about it. It really is the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done.”