It was an emotional moment when Elleana Garcia got the call she had been named the next Miss Augusta.
“I was at my apartment. I was not expecting the phone call,” she recalled. “I was freaking out and crying in the living room.”
The Kennesaw State University freshman won the crown in this year’s Miss Georgia Statewide Digital Competition, a platform for pageants to be carried out online instead of organizing an in-person event. She’d had some pageant experience in middle school, but was really inspired to compete again after meeting the previous Miss Augusta, Quinn Shelt, and winning the inaugural Memories Matter Pageant organized by Shelt.
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“As soon as I met her, she just motivated me and then winning the Miss Memories Matter Pageant kind of propelled me to have the confidence to submit all of my paperwork and apply to be Miss Augusta,” Garcia said.
Miss Augusta is a proud and active member of the Augusta community, interning at Destination Augusta and being named a Bank of America Student Leader during her senior year at Richmond County Technical Career Magnet School. Here are some of her favorite parts of the area: