Amador Valley High School Student Crowned National American Miss Junior Teen

Amador Valley sophomore Raven Delk has been crowned National American Miss Junior Teen.

On November 27, the reigning California Miss Junior Teen competed against nearly 50 delegates from across the country in Anaheim.

Equipped with her beautiful smile, abounding confidence, and her supportive parents, Raven impressed the judges excelling in all four categories of the competition; formal wear, personal introduction, interview, and community service, to secure her win.

Raven began competing in pageants at about 10 years old after convincing her reluctant parents that she had found an avenue to pursue her pageant dreams through National Miss American, a pageantry system that encourages their girls to embrace their own natural beauty.

“My parents didn’t want me to become one of those little kids caked with makeup and looking older than they really were,” Raven told Patch. 

“National Miss America is great because they don’t allow girls under the age of 12 to wear makeup and enforce that girls should appear age appropriate.”

Although many pageants focus on physical beauty, Raven was particularly drawn to National Miss America’s pageant because of their recognition of inner beauty.

Raven, a beautiful young 16-year-old herself, demonstrated her winning inner beauty as she explained her interview platform, “Teen Self-Esteem.”

At the age of eight, Raven had moved from the East Coast and began attending a predominately Caucasian grammar school outside of Pleasanton.  It didn’t take long before Raven began to feel different.

“Two little girls in my class told me they were not allowed to sit with me because I was black,” Raven said. 

“I began sitting by myself at lunch and had a difficult time understanding what was wrong with me.”

That’s when her parents, who Raven said were her biggest heroes, taught her to rise above the taunting and to embrace the beautiful girl she was inside and out.

“Girls shouldn’t compare themselves to society’s standards of beauty,” she said. 

“They should focus on being the best they can be and not compare themselves to others.”

“Now that I’m National American Miss Junior Teen I have the honor of having a microphone and an audience to hear what I have to say,” she said. 

“If I can change one life by convincing a girl to embrace her inner beauty, then I’ve fulfilled my duties.”

On July 31, Raven was awarded the title of California Miss Junior Teen after competing against 130 peers across the state.

As Raven began to connect with the other contestants at the national pageant, she discovered that many of the girls had competed with up to 400 girls to win their state title. With thousands of girls vying for the national title, Raven knew she would have to work hard to win.

“I was prepared and had practiced for hours,” she said but admitted she was one of half of the contestants that arrived in Anaheim without a professional coach.

“I knew if I was going to win, I would have to really work for it.”

Although Raven attributes her interview topic of “Teen Self-Esteem” to part of the reason she won, she also believes her participation in community service helped her as well.

Raven is a volunteer at Kids Against Hunger, a non-profit organization whose mission is to significantly reduce the number of hungry children in the USA and to feed starving children throughout the world.

As the winner of the state competition, Raven was given the honor of choosing a non-profit organization to donate dozens of teddy bears donated by the contestants of the California American Junior Miss competition. Raven chose Shepard’s Gate, a local organization that provides housing and services to battered women and their children.

Contestants also brought books to the state competition that were donated to Book for Barrios, a Concord-based non-profit organization that collects reading material for children in remote barrio public schools throughout the Republic of the Philippines.

What’s next for Raven Delk?

Raven plans to actively contribute to , where she is the captain of the Junior Varsity Cheer Squad and the Vice President of the sophomore class. 

She also plans to continue her involvement at The Well Christian Church in Dublin where her father, Scott Delk, works as an elder.

Raven currently works at The English Rose in downtown Pleasanton.

She is scheduled to participate in the Burlingame Holiday Parade on December 2 at 6 p.m.

Beyond that, Raven hopes to one day become a talk show host and study international relations. 

“There are so many interesting places throughout the world and I would like be able to find ways for people to better communicate with one another globally.”