Sparkling Snippets

    Who are you? What are your values? Both are just some questions that help create your personal brand. With experience in pageantry, I've had to develop a personal brand before, but I didn't answer all these questions. While deciding on my brand I primarily looked at the surface layer of my life. I never had this deep introspection into my "why," so I wanted to take a deeper look at each of these questions and how they can apply to my personal brand as I prepare for nationals.      Who am I? On the surface I'm a college student with straight A's. I'm a cheerleader, performer, and choreographer while also working as a performer at a princess party company and the Education Assistant at the Renaissance Theatre. I showed alpacas my whole life and owned an alpaca until his passing. While all these pieces of my life are true, they are simply activities I'm involved in. None of these define who I am. Without these I would still be Cassandra, so who is tha...

     As a musical theatre major, I'm required to have an assistant stage manager credit to graduate, but who would've thought I'd be lucky enough to ASM the 60x60 dance show. While we have to spend time creating the run sheet, ensuring cast members are present, and helping backstage during the show, in rehearsals a lot of the time I get to just watch the magic happen. Dance was my first love, long before theatre. I was too scared of people to speak to them let alone speak onstage, but I loved performing at every dance recital for my studio.      While I no longer dance in a studio, I love getting to take dance classes at ONU, dance in shows, and choreograph for the Mansfield Youth Theatre. As a choreographer I'm constantly jotting down ideas because there's so many directions any piece can go, but it's about what iteration speaks to you. There are times you'll have ten ideas for one song, but each one leans into a different style. Oftentimes I record each...

    Nowadays many don't listen to the radio or read the newspaper, which means that marketing teams must find new strategies to attract attention. In pageantry a lot of our promotion of not only the organization, but our own service initiatives happen online. We must work to keep up with trends so we can use the algorithm to reach the right demographic.      One part of the reading that stuck out to me was how some companies learned how to use online engagement to grow their reach. This got me wondering how I could use the concept of viewer engagement to continue to grow my viewing rates from being follower dominant to non-follower dominant. In the case of pageants, it's not as simple as selling a product. Instead, we are trying to convince teens and young women that our organization is the right fit for them. I thought about the possibility of inviting titleholders from our state organization and beyond to do joint livestreams to share their story. Since the ...

    It feels like this break has been a lifetime long. Between getting my wisdom teeth removed and constantly working on nationals prep for the spring, I really packed as much into those short weeks as possible. Now it's January and we're already back to school. While some of my classes are a little nerve wracking...musicianship I'm talking about you...I'm excited to see what this semester has in store. I really missed seeing everyone on campus, so despite the cold I couldn't wait to get the day started!      Going into this semester I have a vision filled with goals, so I figured it was time for a little "carpe diem" if you will. One of my biggest goals is creating a routine that gives me plenty of time to complete work while also keeping my sleep schedule intact. While 6 a.m. is an early wakeup call, I know it'll pay off in the long run if I keep at it. Another goal outside of school is ensuring I'm taking time to prep for nationals so I can tr...