May 19, 2005

Almaden’s Shannon Louie wins Miss San Jose,
heads for Miss California contest

By Julie Davis Berry
Executive Editor

Shannon Louie, a 23-year-old graduate of Santa Clara University and resident of San Jose’s Almaden Valley, was crowned Miss San Jose in March.

Shannon Louie was crowned Miss San Jose in March and will compete for the Miss California title in June.

A total of 14 girls competed for the titles of Miss San Jose and Miss Redwood City at the competition, which was held at Carrington Hall in Redwood City.

Louie entered the contest after a friend was named Miss Oakland and says it was the first time she had ever entered a contest like this. “I wanted to go to grad school but it was really expensive to go back to S.C.U. so I thought the $1,000 scholarship would be helpful.”

Louie’s titled her community service platform “Music: Music to Unify, Strengthen, and Involve the Community.”

She currently teaches piano lessons to students in San Jose and wants to expand her piano business into a studio for art education. In addition to teaching piano lessons, Louie has worked as the training and public relations supervisor for Mulberry Neckwear, a necktie manufacturer and Henry Jacobson, a lifestyle brand of upper end men’s clothing and recently was hired by Macys.com in San Francisco.

The graduate of Simonds Elementary, Castillero Middle and Leland High holds special fondness for Leland music teacher Alfonse Luis, who “inspired me to appreciate individual instruments and to pursue a career in music.”

Louie will go on in June to compete for the title of Miss California, an official preliminary to the Miss America Scholarship Pageant. The weeklong event will be held in Fresno.

When asked about the reputation of contests as “beauty contests” she replied, “Forty percent is based on an interview which you build around a community service platform (mine was music), 30 percent is based on talent (I played the piano), and only 30 percent is based on how the contestant appears in an evening gown and swim suit and how she carries herself and how she answers a random question. The swimsuit part is really to see how physically fit the contestants are and how well you take care of yourself and how well you carry yourself.”

According to local organizer GH Armour, “the girls don’t compete so much against the other girls so much as they compete against a list of standards. Although there was a very fine group of girls this year, Shannon really stood out and had a lot of the standards we were looking for.”

While some pageants are mainly based on beauty, the Miss San Jose pageant is based on different criteria, where community service plays a very important role in the process and the scholarship money can only used to further a contestant’s education.

As the world’s largest provider of scholarship assistance for young women and one of the nation’s leading achievement programs, The Miss America Organization last year made available more than $45 million in cash and tuition scholarship assistance.

Based in Atlantic City, N.J., the Miss America Organization is built around the premise of providing young women with a vehicle to further their personal and professional goals and instilling a spirit of community service through a variety of unique nationwide community-based programs.

For more information about the Miss San Jose Scholarship Organization, contact GH Armour at (408) 375-5793.