Miss International pageant features student contestant

By Kellie Geist

Media Credit: photo contributed
Ashlei's future holds hopes of becoming an FBI agent.

While the rest of us will spend the next couple weeks going to classes and work, Ashlei Sothard will be hanging out in Mahé in the Seychelles off the east coast of Africa. But she won't be lounging poolside - Sothard will be representing the U.S. in the 36th Annual Miss International Beauty Pageant.

"I was on stage at the Miss Kentuckiana Pageant when they told me I'd been selected to go," she said. "It was really exciting."

One of just 44 contestants from around the world, Sothard, a senior criminal justice major, will spend 10 days posing for photo shoots and strutting her stuff for the Oct. 13 worldwide telecast. But her pageant career is only four years in the making.

"I started competing when I was 17 with the Miss Kentucky Teen USA pageant," Sothard said. "I've been competing ever since."

Sothard has been named Miss Kentucky Teen Model 2003, Miss Kentucky Hawaiian Tropic, Miss Kenton County 2006 and Miss Virginia Hawaiian Tropic 2007. However, she's never been in a pageant that took take her away from home, work and school for three weeks.

"A few of my professors asked why I didn't just drop for the semester," Sothard said. "But I'm all set to graduate in December, so I asked if I could take my tests before I left." She said some of her classes have online quizzes and assignments, so during her downtime in Mahé, she'll be using her laptop and new wireless card to study and keep up.

"Most of my professors were pretty cool about it," she said. "It's just such a great opportunity that they didn't want to tell me I couldn't go."

Although the 21-year-old said she's thrilled to be representing her country in the pageant, she's also a little excited about her journey to Mahé.

"My layover is in France, so I'll be in Paris for a full day by myself," she said. "That in itself is like a dream come true."

One of her outfits for the pageant is a modified Reds uniform complete with a cropped jersey, knee-length baseball pants and knee socks. "Baseball is known worldwide as America's pastime, and Cincinnati had the first professional baseball team," Sothard said in a press release. "It just seemed perfect for a national costume. Besides, it will be beautiful after it's tailored, and I add lots of rhinestones and sequins."

Sothard's pageant career has also taken her to Hawaii, New York City, Canada and Mexico. "A lot of what I enjoy (about competing) is having everything together and knowing that all of my hard work is paying off," she said.

Source: The Northerner