Parents are more likely to have a son compete in the Super Bowl than to have a daughter compete in the Miss America pageant, explained Katie Ann Powell, a Utah native who competed in the 2025 Miss America pageant.
“There’s only 52 of us,” Powell noted. “So it’s a pretty rare thing.”
On Sunday night, this year’s 52 delegates representing the 50 U.S. states, District of Columbia and Puerto Rico gathered for the annual Miss America pageant in Orlando, Florida.
The crown went to Miss Alabama, Abbie Stockard, but Powell, who earned the most inspirational award, believes she won big.
Most inspirational is a unique title awarded to the delegate who best “embodies the spirit of Miss America” through behaviors and interactions backstage, Powell explained.
Moments from onstage are taken into account, but creating organic, meaningful connections offstage is a leading criteria.
Powell says she didn’t expect to earn the title, since she was competing against 51 “wonderful” women.
“There were some special moments I had with a lot of the delegates, and to know that they had felt that, that was special,” Powell said. “To feel God’s hand and God’s miracles with that as well, and to feel like this week was more than just a crown, that it was really (about) relationships, and it was (about) friends that I’m taking into the rest of the life and that people could identify, that meant the world to me.”
Powell’s Utah background
Competing in a Miss America pageant is nearly a yearlong process, and preparation for the event begins years in advance.
Powell’s first experience with the Miss America program happened while she was an elementary school student in Utah, she said.
In fifth grade, Powell suffered from a MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) infection. Educating the public on MRSA was a platform the then-Miss Sandy chose to advocate for, so she asked Powell to participate in a local news interview with her in hopes of debunking common misconceptions about infection.
Powell agreed, but didn’t envision herself becoming directly involved in the Miss America program when she grew up.
But as a teenager, one of Powell’s friends at Hillcrest High School informed her of the scholarship benefits that can come from participating in Miss America pageants.
She gave it a shot and “got turned into a world that I never thought I would be in,” Powell explained. In 2016, Powell was crowned Miss Sandy.
“Most of my pageant career was in Utah,” Powell explained.
But Powell didn’t wear a Miss Utah sash while competing in Miss America. She represented the District of Columbia. Powell has family roots in Washington, D.C., and currently resides there, but she credits her Utah education with benefitting her pageantry career.
Powell attended elementary, middle and high school in Utah and received her undergraduate degree from BYU. She also studied harp performance at the University of Utah.
“Schooling really helped develop my insights and my ideas,” Powell said. “My education at BYU helped me formulate opinions and become ideologically sound and service-minded, and (aided in) that part of the pageantry. And then the University of Utah helped me prepare completely for the talent portion (of pageantry).”
Powell was not the only Utah native competing in the 2025 Miss America pageant. Paris Matthews, a 26-year-old University of Utah graduate from Cottonwood Heights, also took the stage, per Miss Utah.
Matthews is an advocate for hospitalized children who aims to become an executive at Primary Children’s Hospital.
‘I’m credit and crowns’
Using her Miss America platform, Powell advocated for financial literacy.
“I hope to show women that you can build your credit score and you can wear a crown,” Powell said. “I’m credit and crowns.”
As a financial adviser, Powell shares her passion for financial literacy both on and off stage.
“I have been teaching financial literacy all throughout D.C.,” she said. “I am working all the time to get financial literacy in the classroom and in our community.”
For the talent portion of the pageant, Powell showcased her harp performance skills. During her interview with the judges, she highlighted the importance of music and shared how music has provided opportunities to connect with others.
“I understand that I don’t look like many Americans. I’m not racially the same, I’m not ethnically the same, I’m not religiously the same, but what I do have is music, and what I’ve seen in Washington, D.C., is how music has been this great collaboration and this great understanding,” Powell said during the competition.
She continued, “Even if you speak a different language, even if you look different, what we can all understand and experience together is music, because I’ve seen that just completely open doors for me in D.C. and and where there was barricades, there’s now bridges because of music.”
Miss America delegates are given just one opportunity to compete for the coveted title. While Powell was not crowned Miss America 2025, she has found that the real prize was how the Miss America program has positively shaped her into the woman she is today.
“I’ve learned throughout the years, it doesn’t matter what people think, but it really matters who I’ve become, and I’m so proud of myself,” said Powell.
“I don’t really care what the judges saw or didn’t see, because I know who I’ve become, and I know how God’s magnified my gifts and my talents through this process,” Powell continued. “And I know that my life has been changed for the better, because I’ve gone through this very intense process to prepare myself for a better life.”