Written by: Amy Mejias
Kaylyn Levoy, sophomore marketing major at Southern Adventist University, is the new Miss Chattanooga 2024 in the Mrs. America pageant system.
According to Levoy, the title came to her unexpectedly. By a chance meeting, she met a local boutique owner who was rebranding her business and asked if Levoy would model for the photo shoot.
“During that shoot,” Levoy said, “I actually met the winner of Miss Tennessee from last year and was modeling with her.”
Claire Portilla, the current Miss Tennessee and last year’s Miss Chattanooga for the Miss Division of the Mrs. America Inc. Pageant, reached out to Levoy a month later to see if she would apply to be her successor for 2024.
According to Portilla, there are multiple local pageant systems, and most no longer do pageants.
Miss Chattanooga is determined through an application process that includes references and interviews. Levoy was selected via that process in November and will compete for the Miss Tennessee title along with contestants from other major Tennessee cities in a pageant that will take place April 25-27 in Gatlinburg.
Portilla said she connected with Levoy because they shared similar interests.
“We met through a photo shoot opportunity we both had, and she just was so sweet and very encouraging,” Portilla said. “The way she talked about school and what she wanted to do [with her life], I just instantly clicked with her.
“Obviously, I’m a little older than she is — I’m 26 — but I sort of saw her as a sweet little sister,” she continued. “I thought she would be a great pick for Chattanooga, being young and vibrant and outgoing and wanting to get involved in the community. She had such a heart for serving; and she, in my opinion, was the perfect person to represent Chattanooga.”
Levoy said it will be her second time participating in a pageant when she goes to Gatlinburg. She participated in one when she was about 4 years old, growing up in Madison, Tenn., just north of Nashville.
After several years at Madison Elementary and Madison Academy, she transferred to Georgia Cumberland Academy (GCA) in her junior year of high school. Levoy said she developed great friendships while at GCA, and since many of those friends were planning to attend Southern, she chose Southern, as well.
Levoy hopes to use her degree in the future to work in international remote marketing.
“[I want to] travel the world and market for other companies,” she said. “I feel like I have pretty good people skills, and I have a huge respect for how big the world is and how many different people there are and different cultures, and I would just love to understand them.”
“From where I am standing now, this is 100 percent just an opportunity that approached me and that I am seeing as a chance to give back to my community, since Chattanooga has given me so much,” she continued.
One of the ways Levoy intends to give back and support the community is by advocating for the Chattanooga Autism Center; her goal is to raise $15,000 for the venue.
Levoy chose the Chattanooga Autism Platform in support of a family friend that she knew growing up who was autistic. She said every week at church, he would ask her and others to pray for him to have safe travels on upcoming trips. She said his kindness made an impression on her.
“He is so welcoming every single time and just wants to talk to you and is always smiling. I was really impacted by that. [Autism is] … a topic that isn’t talked about enough.” she said. “Hearing that they have a center that supported that here, I was like, ‘This is what I want to do.’”
People often focus on the pageant and don’t realize that applicants must go through many steps in a long process, said Levoy.
“The bulk of getting involved in a pageant is the months of participation, involvement and prep before, and the months of it after. The actual pageant itself is two days,” she said. “[Part of the preparation is] representing your platform and getting out and getting your hands in the community and seeing who you can connect with.
“When it comes to marketing myself, it’s just having to be authentic and saying, ‘I don’t know what I am doing, to be completely honest,’” she said. “This is not a world that I am from or know a lot about. But when someone asks me to step up and serve, I’m like, ‘OK, I can get behind that.’”
