On Feb. 22, Seminole High School’s PTSA held its annual scholarship pageant: Mr. and Miss SHS. This year, Seminole has been pushing for gender equality through the inclusion of a new position: Mr. SHS. Over 20 applications were submitted with 12 participants in the pageant.

The finalists are listed below:

Mr. and Miss SHS: Srikar Gadamsetty and Trinity Meyer with a scholarship prize of $750
First Runner-up: Kashyap Sreeram and Serra Sowers with a scholarship prize of $500
Second Runner-up: Vedic Sharma and Aishwarya Babuji with a scholarship prize of $250

In order to participate in the Mr. and Miss SHS pageant, interested juniors filled out an application consisting of their high school resume and an essay regarding their goals for our school as Mr. or Miss SHS. Once these applications are submitted, participants are also interviewed by a panel of judges in order to learn more information about the candidates before the actual pageant.

Srikar Gadamsetty and Trinity Meyer were crowned this year’s Mr. and Miss SHS. Both students are juniors in the IB program. In the future, Gadamsetty aims to attend a reputable college to pursue a career in either criminal justice or patent law. Meyer also plans on attending a university to study public policy or political science, in hopes of becoming an attorney.

“I was mainly attracted to the idea of taking some financial strains off of my parents for when I go to college to help them with a better retirement as I know they’ve worked super hard for me,” said Gadamsetty. “I also really like that the hard work and effort that I put into piano were recognized and seering that my friends were cheering for me and encouraging me to go farther with it.”

Mr. and Miss SHS represent our school at events and meetings scheduled on campus and also assist visitors, whether future students or business partners, and show them around Seminole High School. They also play a role in many advisory committees and attend meetings and ceremonies to represent the student body.

“[As Miss SHS,]I have the opportunity to work even more closely with the [PTSA] and especially with administration to help solve problems around the school and help to bring all parts of our school together,” said Meyer.

Previously, this competition was known as simply the Miss SHS competition, as participants were only girls. However this year, for the first time, there has been an inclusion of a Mr. SHS. This marks a great change in our school’s history as it shows the increasing gender equality on our campus. By opening the pageant to boys as well, it allows for a fair chance of both boys and girls to earn scholarships and be a leader in their community.

“I am very humbled that my grade had the opportunity to be the pioneers of the [Mr. SHS] competition,” said Gadamsetty. “I hope that we exceeded [the PTSA’s] expectations and made the Mr. SHS competition available to the future classes as well.”

Congratulations to all of the participants who competed in the Mr. and Miss SHS 2019 pageant!

Mr. SHS
-Srikar Gadamsetty: classical piano
-Kashyap Sreeram: traditional indian singing
-Vedic Sharma: speech
-Marvin Bacon: dramatic monologue

Miss SHS
-Trinity Meyer: singing
-Arianna Zhai: violin
-Neha Chittaluru: action painting
-Sneha Suresh: action painting
-Aishwarya Babuji: indian fusion dance
-Serra Sowers: musical theater piece
-Alyssa Seabury: speech
-Brianna Alvarado: speech