Miss Pa. hopeful fights for literacy

Communication graduate student Nzinga Shaw has a little over a month to perfect her poise, posture, walking and public speaking techniques.

With the goal of promoting youth literacy, she hopes to become the next Miss Pennsylvania USA and is entered in the pageant, which will be held in Pittsburgh this November.

With the help of a college friend, current Miss New Jersey Janaye Ingram, Shaw is preparing to compete in front of an audience of 3,000 people.

"I am not surprised Nzinga entered the Miss Pennsylvania USA Pageant, because she's never been one to shy away from a challenge," friend and Penn Law student Jillian Hooper says. "I'm just surprised she didn't decide to take on Kerry and Bush as well."

Reading STARS at the Lombard Presbyterian Church is one of Shaw's most successful projects. For an hour a week, she helps children "learn how to read faster than they would in public school," she says.

She hopes that competing in the pageant will enable her to show the young girls she tutors that "you can be both pretty and intelligent," she says.

In order to promote literacy, Shaw also works with the public service organization Greater Philadelphia Cares. Recently, she was named project leader of the month for her contribution to several different community service projects.

"Literacy is my No. 1 social cause," Shaw says. "We can't have world peace if people can't read and write, if people can't get jobs, if parents can't help children with their homework. We need to start at a fundamental, basic level and get people to read."

Aside from promoting literacy, Shaw takes 10 children on monthly outings around Philadelphia as part of the Philadelphia Cares' Outings With Kids program.

Shaw also volunteers with Help Philadelphia, a program in which she works with the children of recovering drug addicts to enable their recovering parents to become active citizens in the community once again.

"The girls are so lucky to have someone like Nzinga as a mentor," Hooper says. "Her sense of humor is overpowering, her determination and drive is infectious and her dedication to the education of young black women is awe-inspiring."

With such a commitment to the community and the cause of literacy, Shaw decided that she needed to find a way to get her message across, so that one day she could open her own nonprofit literacy agency.

Hooper says that she's glad Shaw is "brave enough to tackle the challenge in the classrooms and on the catwalk."

The Miss Pennsylvania USA Pageant will be the first time Shaw has ever competed in a pageant. If she wins, she will be provided an agent who will help her in her mission to spread literacy across the country.

The contest is open to all residents of Pennsylvania between the ages of 18 and 26 who are U.S. citizens, have never been married and have never given birth.

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