Through the eyes of a queen candidate
by Kristy Kiesing, posted Oct. 20, 2008
CAFNR Week is a much anticipated and exciting time for the students in the College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources. The week is filled with fun activities such as mud volleyball, scavenger hunts and barbecues.
Clubs and other organizations within CAFNR make up the participants of the week. On top of the events, each group nominates a king and queen candidate. The week becomes a little more competitive once one is chosen as a candidate.
This year I had the chance to run for CAFNR Week queen as a candidate for ACT, Agricultural Communicators of Tomorrow. Upon the nomination, I was incredibly excited and couldn’t wait to start the week. However, I soon found out how intimidating the situation really was.
This is my freshman year at MU. When I began the first stages of CAFNR Week, specifically the interviewing, I was really caught off guard. Here, I met a few of the other queen candidates.
They were juniors and seniors who looked professional and confident. I quickly took a seat in the waiting area and kept to myself as they entertained themselves with talk of weekend plans and CAFNR Week expectations.
As I waited, I thought of the resume I had submitted with my application to be a nominee. I determined how inferior it had to be with my freshman qualifications and extracurricular activities. Being in my first year, I simply hadn’t had the time to become involved with the things I knew these girls had. However, I didn’t let these negative thoughts deter my plans.
I walked into my interview confidently, and I have to say, I thought I did quite well. Although, I decided my chances of winning were pretty low. As the week wore on, it became very stressful. I was beginning to have my first round of exams and was becoming more active in other organizations. It was very difficult to decide which events I could attend and which I would opt to miss out on.
By the end of the week, I was very disappointed in the amount of time I had to give to CAFNR Week. In all, it was an exciting and fun experience that gave me good practice with time management. If I could do it any differently I would have put my heart into my candidacy. Royalty nominee or not, I highly recommend everyone’s participation in next year’s CAFNR Week.
