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P.O. Box 290969 Columbia, South Carolina 29229 |
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P.O. Box 290969 Columbia, South Carolina 29229 |
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2007 S.C.A.S.R.O. / S.C.D.A.R.E. Conference Opening Ceremony Speaker Miss South Carolina 2006
Shelley Bryson Benthall Shelley is the 20 year old daughter of Diane and Rick Benthall of Florence, South Carolina. Her mother, Diane is a Middle School Math teacher and her father, Rick is a Freelance commercial writer and producer. She is the third child of seven. (Brothers Blaine, 25 and Logan, 12 and sisters Kenzie, 23, twins Abby and Kali, 17, and Shay, 14.) She attended Belmont University in Nashville in the school of Music Business and is a rising junior at Clemson University, with a plan to major in University Food Science and Nutrition Dietetics and graduate with honors. She hopes to use her degree to work with children as a Pediatric Dietitian and also has ambitions to record music in the Country/Christian Music Industry. Shelley was previously crowned Miss South Carolina Teen in 2003, and is the first Miss South Carolina Teen to become Miss South Carolina. Her talent is Vocal. Ever since she first stepped on stage at age four, she has loved to perform. Academically, Shelley has earned Who’s Who among High School Students in America, National Honor Society, the SC Academic Life Scholarship, Dean’s List, and Academic Sorority Member 2004-2005. During high school and college, she worked in many capacities: as a swim lesson instructor with the YMCA, as a Young Life Camp Leader and Club Leader, as a Barista at a coffee shop, as an office assistant, front desk clerk and gym trainer, and as a nanny for two families. Other accomplishments include volunteering over 500 hours with various community programs; devoting over l50 hours to promoting groups such as D.A.R.E. and S.A.D.D.; developing a school program “XPAND the Promise” to promote responsible decisions concerning substance abuse; partnering with the South Carolina Department of Alcohol and other Drug Abuse Service as keynote speaker, speaking motivationally at churches and festivals in South Carolina and Tennessee; and she was chosen as one of five students in the state to perform at a banquet to raise money for the arts in South Carolina. At the Miss South Carolina pageant, she received the swimsuit preliminary award, as well as over-all fitness award for the pageant. Shelley’s platform “Above the Influence of Alcohol and Drugs” is very personal. For the past five years, she has watched her own father battle alcohol and drug addiction. The devastation of lies, the financial struggles, and the man addiction had made him soon began to control her life. Shelley realized that she had to make a choice to either “let this obstacle break me” or overcome it and use this experience to change the way youth today look at alcohol and drugs and teach them to rise above the problem before it starts. “My father took his first drink of alcohol at l6, and now at 53, he battles that one decision every day.” Shelley’s desire is to help the youth of today receive accurate, first hand information about the devastating effects of alcohol and drug usage, to develop life-long skills to resist peer pressure, and to build confidence and esteem needed to stay focused on their goals and the pursuit of their passions. She is interested in sharing how God has taken her life, which was full of pain, and share how her faith has brought her through the turmoil which alcohol and drugs created in her life. It became clear that God placed in her a desire to share her struggles and heartaches and she wants to tell youth how she made the decision to define herself and how they can deal with their own struggles and pressures, but best of all find their own strengths, their gifts and their purpose. “If just one person hears and believes, then all my own struggles have been worth it.”
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