What Does Miss Missouri have to do with Pendleton County?

By Nila Harris

Dry Ridge native Hayley Leach was crowned as Miss Missouri 2023 last month. But how is she connected to Pendleton County? Leach’s grandfather Willie Leach raised his family in the Marcus community. Hayley’s aunt Terri went through Pendleton County Schools and graduated from PCHS in 1982. Willie Leach moved his family to Grant County when Hayley’s dad Tom was in middle school. Tom ended up marrying and raising his family in the Dry Ridge community.

Hayley is a 2016 graduate of Grant County High School and the daughter of Tom and Rebecca Leach. She grew up on a cattle and tobacco farm with her younger brother Matthew. When Hayley was a child, her brother was diagnosed with autism. She began to see firsthand the challenges her brother faced in school and the lack of information available to her as a sibling and to her parents.

After high school, Hayley attended the University of Kentucky, receiving a bachelor’s degree in political science, and a degree in writing, rhetoric, and digital studies. Upon graduation from UK, Hayley became a public-school teacher through Teach for America and was trained and placed in an underserved area. Hayley soon became aware that a population of students were not always receiving the services listed in their Individual Education Plan. She saw families who had difficulty finding the resources they needed to help their children. She noticed the similarities between her students and her home life. As Hayley became more involved in pageantry, she knew that her community service platform needed to be a focus on autism awareness and being an advocate for these children.

Hayley and her brother Matthew started working together raising awareness and teaching acceptance. They co-authored the books See the Able, Not the Label and Frankie and Finn to help share their message. They developed a podcast called Puzzle in Progress, which can be found on Apple and Spotify podcasts.

“Our goal is to share our story via different outlets and provide a variety of different perspectives through interviews with family members, educators, professionals in the field, and other young people committed to the important work of autism awareness and acceptance. By sharing our family’s experiences with autism, we have helped change attitudes about people that have developmental disabilities.”

The pageants Hayley has been a part of, have highlighted this journey. According to Leach, she has been involved in the Miss America Organization for the last seventeen years. She has competed in all age divisions within the Miss Kentucky Scholarship Organization.  She earned the title of Miss Kentucky United States in 2020 and several other competitions across the state.

When Hayley was accepted to law school at Washington University in St. Louis, she decided that she would enter the Miss Missouri competition. Her desire to do this spread across many realms. It had been a goal of hers for the past 20 years to make it to the Miss America stage.  She knew that she would work hard to represent Missouri well, should she win.

As Miss Missouri, Hayley would have a platform as an autism awareness advocate. Plus, any scholarship dollars earned would greatly help her in the pursuit of a degree in Labor and Employment law with a specialty in disability issues and advocacy.

This December, Hayley will represent Missouri in the Miss America competition. She has a busy year ahead of her traveling to events across Missouri and sharing her community service initiative. Be sure to watch the Miss America pageant and root for this highly motivated and success-driven young lady raised on a farm, with ties to our county.