The deadline for the Miss Jamaica Festival Queen Competition 2018 has been extended to Monday, April 16.

Entry forms for the competition can be obtained on the Jamaica Cultural Development Commission (JCDC) website at www.jcdc.gov.jm, the JCDC Head Office at 3-5 Phoenix Avenue in Kingston, or at any JCDC parish office islandwide.

Director of Marketing and Public Relations, JCDC, Stephen Davidson, told JIS News that the main reason for the extension is to give more persons the opportunity to participate.

“We realised that many of our entrants would be in university or in high school and so we wanted to give them the full opportunity to participate,” he said.

Mr. Davidson noted that the parish coronations, which are normally held during the weekends in May, will now take place in June. He said that this will give a wider cross section of persons the opportunity to participate in the programme, once they have completed their activities.

He is encouraging young women between 18 and 25 years old to enter the competition.

“It is a wonderful platform for them to give back to their community, the parish as well as to the country. We are looking for talented young ladies, who are intelligent, who are looking to make an impact on nation building,” he said, adding that the women must first compete at the parish level before the Grand National Coronation, which forms part of the Jamaica Independence celebrations.

Mr. Davidson said that a significant component of the competition is the implementation of projects by the parish winners as well as the National Queen, who will do an islandwide project.

“There are no losers in this competition. Everyone who enters will win because of the training and the development that they receive at the various levels of the competition,” he added.

Mr. Davidson noted that the competition is a platform for young women “to develop their self-esteem, their personal and organisational skills and to be ambassadors for Jamaica.”

He said that since the inception of the competition in 1963, several past queens have done well in various fields, including medicine, media, music and politics.

Some of the past queens include Dr. Marsha Barnett, Jennifer “Jenny-Jenny” Small, Jacinth Hall-Tracey, Dahlia Harris, Krystal Tomlinson and Kaysia Johnson.

 

SOURCE: http://jis.gov.jm/new-deadline-for-miss-festival-queen-competition-2018/