ELLY GRIMM
• Leader & Times
The Miss Kansas crown now has a new head under it with Emily Rugg.
Rugg was crowned at the Miss Kansas Pageant in early June, and as she tells it, she is a Kansas girl through and through.
“I grew up in Kiowa, which is kind of near the Oklahoma border, and I ended up with 12 students in my graduating class, so I definitely know that small-town life,” Rugg said. “Shortly before I started college, my family moved to Greensburg, and they’ve been there for the past eight or nine years, so I’m lucky to call Kiowa and Greensburg home since I’ve got roots in both those places. I’ve lived in Wichita the past five years since graduating from college, where I currently work at Textron. I’ve been involved with the Miss Kansas Organization since I was about 5 years old and my grandmother was a volunteer with them, so I started out as a Sunflower Princess, then competed all five eligible years in the Teen competition, and this was my sixth time competing for Miss Kansas, and I’m so glad I decided to come back.”
For Rugg, that exposure to pageant life began at an early age.
“My grandmother was a volunteer with the Miss Kansas Organization, so when I was little, I got to stay in the dorms with all the pageant contestants and see all the preparations and everything else, and it was amazing seeing all of that with my vantage point,” Rugg said. “When I got old enough to compete, it was really a no-brainer because I had looked up to all of these other women and wanted to be one of them. I also wanted to have a big stage to sing on – I love to sing, that’s my talent, so that was another factor in me wanting to compete with this organization.”
Rugg added the pageant itself was a great experience.
“For Miss Kansas week, we all arrived June 1, and we were there for that entire week. We all arrived, got situated in the dorms at Pratt Community College, and then we did rehearsals and other prep,” Rugg said. “It’s all really, really fun, and we all referred to it as basically summer camp. The competition itself started June 4 with the private interviews, and then June 5 and 6 were the preliminaries, and the finals took place June 7, so it’s been just more than a month since I got crowned.”
And upon hearing her name, Rugg said there was a mix of emotions.
“I’ve watched Miss Kansas be crowned as a fellow competitor for a few years now, and I’ve always wondered what that moment would be like for me. I know other winners have said something along the lines of ‘I completely blacked out, I don’t even remember anything!’ and that turned out to be more true than I thought,” Rugg said with a chuckle. “I remember standing there near the end holding hands with the first runner-up, Katelyn Andrist, who’s one of my really good friends, and we were both psyching each other up, and then my name was called, and from there, it’s all rather a blur. What’s really funny is they tell you the day of the finals ‘If you win Miss Kansas, you need to tell your families we’ll come get them, and we all need to meet at X location for photos, etc.’ But I didn’t want to jinx anything, so I didn’t say anything to my family. After my name got called, I was ecstatic and in shock, and then in the midst of all of that, I remembered I hadn’t said anything to my family, so there was a chance they had no idea where to meet me or anything. I couldn’t believe it because I’ve worked hard at this for years now and hearing my name called was just such a rush. I couldn’t be more thankful the judges chose me to represent Kansas and all the other women on the stage with me.”
And since being crowned, Rugg said she has been on the move throughout the state.
“I’m still working at Textron full time, I work there as a K-12 program manager, so I’m learning to balance both full-time roles, which has been challenging and exciting for me. I’ve also been doing several sponsor visits and preparing for the Miss America Pageant with headshots and some of that work,” Rugg said. “I also got to be part of a 4th of July parade down in Hardtner and a 5th of July parade up in Hanover, so I’ve already done some traveling throughout the state and visited a handful of different communities, which has been really fun, and I’ve got more stops planned out. And I will be doing even more traveling, so if anyone wants to follow my journey, they can follow me on Facebook as Miss Kansas and on Instagram at @missamericaks.”
With her community service platform, Rugg said she took inspiration from some of her own experiences.
“My platform is called ‘From Gap to Gain,’ and the goal is to provide professional skills for a stronger future, With that, I’ve got a few state partnerships and one still in the works. I’ve worked with Junior Achievement of Kansas for a long time and I go into fourth grade classrooms talking about entrepreneurship and financial literacy because that’s when children’s minds really start to grasp those sorts of concepts and that independent learning, and it also helps support that young professional aspect of learning,” Rugg said. “I started working at Textron when I was 21 and straight out of college, and while college curriculum does a great job of teaching the basics of what you’ll need to be successful, there’s not really a lot of preparation for what that transition will actually look like. I work in a rather male-dominated field, and only 21 percent of Textron’s global workforce is women, so I walked in to my first adult job after college and was really excited, but I very quickly felt rather out of place because no one had really prepared me to sit in these boardrooms and make these types of decisions. That’s how ‘From Gap to Gain’ was born – I started as a young professional entrepreneur and wanted to build a community of people and help uplift them. I was then introduced to Junior Achievement of Kansas and absolutely loved what they were doing for children, and that’s not an experience I would have had in my rural school district. I was amazed at the opportunity these children were getting at such a young age to learn about business and gain that knowledge, so it made sense to pair the two. It’s what I live and breathe every day at Textron, so I would love to help expand that. As Miss Kansas, it’s going to be really fun for me to take that statewide, and as someone who grew up in a really rural community, I want to be in all counties and know I was able to reach people I might not have been able to otherwise. I’m really excited to travel the state and visit some of these communities we haven’t visited in a while.”
And among all of that, Rugg said there are preparations to be done for the Miss America Pageant in September, which she is excited for.
“I’ve recently been working on my platform paperwork and making some tweaks to my résumé I’d turned in for the state competition, so there’s all of those logistics to take care of. I’m really excited for the talent portion of the competition – as a little girl who would sing with my dad and his band all the time, singing on the Miss America stage will be an absolute dream come true,” Rugg said. “I’m going to be doing some voice lessons to strengthen all of that, and I’ve also got some other behind-the-scenes practice I’ll be doing to make sure all of that is tight and ready to go. I’m really excited to connect with the other state winners. One of my favorite things, and one of the reasons I continued coming back to the Miss Kansas Pageant is those relationships I’ve made with other young women from across the state. In fact, I’ve been in the weddings of three of my fellow past contestants, so these women are lifelong friends, and the chance to connect with a whole new group of young women from all across the U.S. who are doing great work of their own is absolutely amazing.”
Another goal Rugg said she has as Miss Kansas will be recruiting other young women to the Miss Kansas Organization.
“I’m a walking, talking testimony of what this organization can do, so I’m excited to show how if someone like me, who grew up in a small town near the Oklahoma border, can become Miss Kansas, they can too,” Rugg said. “I’m excited to see if we can recruit some new faces to the organization, I would love that. I always say you have to have something you’re trying to gain that has nothing to do with winning the crown and title. Yes, this year happened to be my year to win Miss Kansas, but that’s not the full reason I competed. You gain professional skills, a new network of people, and a lot of personal growth. If young women would look at it more from that perspective in terms of gaining those skills, I think there would be more participation, because you do truly gain a lot. I would not have my current job or opportunities had I not competed with the Miss Kansas Organization and practiced those interview skills and everything else you need in order to compete. There are just so, so many valuable lessons and skills young women gain by participating in these types of competitions.”
Overall, Rugg said, she is excited to represent the state as Miss Kansas.
“I would love the state’s support and I would love people to follow me on social media and tag along with everything I’ll be doing while I have the crown,” Rugg said. “And if anyone’s interested in booking me for a speaking engagement, they would just need to send an email to
My Granddaughter. Kedry Wizig just graduated from South Olathe High School. She is beautiful