DYW Changed My Life

I know its weird to say that something has changed my life, but honestly participating in Distinguished Young Women has. It taught me things about myself that I didn't know I didn't know. It taught me how to act in a professional setting and how to act like a grown girl. I believe that every girl should go through this program. This program has created a lifelong bond between 17 girls who didn't know a thing about each other eight months ago.

I did not win one dollar from the program, as our director Betsy would say "ZERO DOLLARS AND ZERO CENTS." I don't mind that I didn't win anything, I didn't come in hoping to win I joined this program because I wanted to be my best self. Something noticeably different about me after the program is that I am so much more confident. You can tell that mostly by my smile, before this program started I absolutely would not smile with my teeth, ( I know it seems like nothing but it looked like I was smirking not smiling). Our director Mrs. Carole pulled me aside one meeting and asked why, I explained that I didn't like my teeth, she challenged me to smile with my teeth. At first it was a bit weird, now its a habit. (thanks Mrs. Carole)

I've never been a popular person, never had a million friends that I went out with on Friday nights to football games. Now because of DYW I've become the best of friends with 16 other girls that I didn't know at the start of my junior year, it's great. we've all become incredible friends that support and genuinely love another. We had and "Unusual" class as Mrs. Carole called it. We bonded and honestly that's the best part about it.

Also I should probably tell you who won our local program this year!
Lydia Clark is the DYW of Okaloosa County 2015, we are all so happy she won and I can honestly say that nobody got jealous or threw a fit. We are all so happy for her and happy that she's representing us, Lydia is a wonderful person and the perfect choice to represent our class. We are making plans to watch her compete at state.

The staple points of Distinguished Young Women is called the "Be Your Best Self" Program. Its based off of five points that are as follows:

Be Healthy- Be physically fit and drug free
Be Involved- Serve your community
Be Studious- Stay in school
Be Ambitious- Set and achieve goals
Be Responsible- Live by moral and ethical principals

Any girls entering their Junior year of high school and would like to participate please register!
You can sign up online here. http://www.ajm.org/participate/
or e-mail Mrs Carole: carolebyrd911@yahoo.com

Now here are some pictures...

Three years of DYW's 

Our AMAZING Sponsor. Systems of Sound provided all of our lighting and sound for FREE!

We all bonded the weeks before show with sleepovers and dinners and random Frozen Yogurt trips. 

pre-show we had loads of free time which involves a lot of crazy!

Before the show began, we started it off the right way, with prayer.

Jackie's talent brought us all to tears, naturally I had to include a picture.
(video hopefully to come) 

The only picture from Fitness were we didn't look like we were about to die. 

We had a lot of free time backstage..

Secret Sister Picture

And time to wear fancy dresses and eat pizza...

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Scholarship Thugs

The ever so beautiful Alyssa..

Ready to take on the world with a smile!

Naturally the first thing we did was take a selfie.