Ten contestants competed in Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc.’s Miss Black & Gold Pageant in the GUC Performance Center Tuesday, March 11.

This year’s crown was presented to sophomore Lauren Blue, a business management major whose platform was “Let’s Move! Through Dance.”

“I’m still shocked — it hasn’t set in yet, but I can’t wait to represent the chapter on campus,” Blue said.

Blue also won the People’s Choice award.

Former Miss Black & Gold Brianna Locke admires her successor.

“I think she’s a sweet and wonderful girl who will be an amazing Miss Black & Gold,” Locke said.

The show did run into a few noticeable technical difficulties early on involving the on stage microphones. There will always be technical difficulties with events this big, though, Locke said.

“It (pageant) could be better with more practices,” Locke said. “But there’s always going to be problems and things out of our control. You just kind of have to go with it.”

Despite facing technical difficulties, Blue still managed to wow the crowd.

“I feel like she deserved it,” said senior Dimitri Orr. “She was a good contestant like the rest of them, but I just feel like she deserved it the most.”

Senior Amy Anderson also said Blue deserved the crown.

“I thought she did great,” Anderson said. “You could tell she was prepared. I loved her lyrical piece, and I thought her evening wear was amazing.”

More went into the pageant than what the audience saw, said Jovonne Baker, first runner-up and Miss Congeniality.

“(The pageant) took hard work.” Baker said. “I had to work on my talent, fitting into my dress and gaining a lot of confidence.”

Countless hours went toward putting Miss Black & Gold together, said pageant chairman Chris Goodman.

“We’ve probably been practicing for at least two and a half months,” Goodman said. “A lot of planning and a lot of delegating of roles and a ton of work went into it.”

Though they had a rocky start, the pageant overall was a huge success, Locke said.

“I thought it was great,” Anderson said. “It was a good turnout. A lot of people were here and all the contestants were very pretty, and they did good overall.