Sumter's Next Generation: Miss Sumter High Kaylee Witherspoon talks of how her crown is another way to serve

For Kaylee Witherspoon, being Miss Sumter High, in all its glitz and glamour, is less about the crown.

When she talks of the title, she talks of how it has guided her community service, from painted rocks tucked along walking trails to little girls smiling as she curls their hair before a pageant to books waiting to be read inside neighborhood little libraries.

For the Sumter High School senior, the title has always been about using the spotlight to brighten someone else's day.

"I think there's a big misconception about pageants," Kaylee said. "People think it's just about how you look, but it's also about how you present yourself and the things you do."

She realized this early on in her pageantry journey. An eighth-grader and audience member at the Miss Sumter High pageant, she was initially interested in the contestants' biographies, community service, school involvement and their overall confidence and presentation on the stage. The entire experience was so exciting to her that she didn't see it as beauty pageantry but as a way to present herself to the public.

Her freshman year of high school, she was nervous to enter the Miss Sumter High pageant, so nervous in fact she nearly didn't sign up. But here's the thing about nerves: Being nervous and doing it anyway means you have courage. It encourages growth, builds self-trust and proves that fear does not control your choices.

And it's a good thing Kaylee did. Her freshman year, she walked away with the crown.

One thing she's learned through competing - and hopes to impress upon others who see pageantry from the outside looking in - is that it's not all about appearance. Pageantry requires great attention to one's personal character, confidence, leadership and community service.

The latter is ingrained in Kaylee's life since a child. A Girl Scout for more than 10 years, community service has always been central to her life. Her primary motivation has been helping others, especially children.

Kaylee has spearheaded many projects and community service efforts in her time with the crown.

The Kindness Rock Project featured about 200 rocks, handpainted with encouraging messages and placed around Sumter, from its downtown streets to Swan Lake to various populated public places, to help spread kindness through unexpected discoveries. This project was built on a larger initiative Kaylee cared deeply about: Mental Health Awareness Month.

The reception from the community made Kaylee's week's worth of hard work well worth it. Finders of her rocks contacted her through the social media account she painted on the rocks, sharing their excitement about the kind find and how it made their day.

"It was almost more fun for me than it is for other people to find them," she said with a smile. "That's one of the best things about service. It doesn't take long, but it has a big impact."

In one of her favorite service experiences, where her love for the community and passion for cosmetology met, Kaylee volunteered at a foster care pageant. The pageant helped raise money for the foster care and helped the children feel special, she said. As a cosmetology student at Sumter Career and Technology Center, her responsibilities were hair and makeup. Her fondest memory from the experience was styling two girls, helping them get dolled up so the beauty could shine from the inside out. It would only nod to her own childhood experience, as her mother attended cosmetology school, passing down her passion for beauty on to her daughter.

"My mom went to cosmetology school, and she always told me that she really enjoyed it and that it was so much fun. So, even if it wasn't something I wanted to pursue further, it's always something I would know how to do. If I didn't want to make a career out of it, I could always do it for my friends or do it for myself," she shared. "I could always have it in my back pocket, but it's so much fun now that I'm actually doing it. It's become so much fun."

The list of community service goes on: donating SPCA boxes and Blessing Boxes, donating books to Little Free Libraries, volunteering at festivals and assisting vendors at the Iris Festival. As she gears up for her senior year of high school, her current goal is to build one, possibly two, Little Free Libraries. Her reason: There just aren't enough in town.

The devotion to service derives from her hope that future titleholders continue building on her work. That the future Miss Sumter High winner maintains the momentum of service with a smile and connection that makes a community.

"Reaching out to people and just simply asking them, 'Hey, is there anything I can do for you?' That is like such an easy way. That is such an easy way to put your service efforts out there," she shared. "I hope what I'm doing sets a good example for what other queens do in the future. I want the future queen to see that, take that and turn it into her own thing of what she thinks the service should be and continue it on."

"It's nothing to be kind and to help people."