This rising Berkeley High senior is going to be crossing the stage at the end of the upcoming school year to receive her diploma.
However, before she gets there, there is another big stage that she is going to cross – hopefully with a crown, but more importantly with a giving spirit that makes this Berkeley High Stag a very well-rounded individual.
Moncks Corner resident Kayley Lindsley is the current titleholder for Teen Miss Lowcountry, and now she has her sights set on claiming the titles of Teen Miss South Carolina, Outstanding Teen and Overall Queen at the organization’s state pageant, happening July 9-14 at the Francis Marion Performing Arts Center in Florence.
Lindsley has grown up through Berkeley County School District; she previously attended Whitesville Elementary and Berkeley Middle. She started pageantry when she was about three years old, working under the Little Miss & Teen South Carolina Pageant organization. She stuck with it for about three years.
After a pretty lengthy 10-year hiatus from pageantry, Lindsley made a pretty epic comeback in September 2022 when she was crowned Teen Miss Lowcountry, a preliminary competition that allows the titleholder to advance to the state pageant. Lindsley went on to make top 11 in the state pageant last year.
Last fall, Lindsley was able to re-claim the Teen Miss Lowcountry title, so she is back again for round two in the state competition. She will compete against more than 20 other girls from around the state for the title.
While it is a competition, Lindsley would be the first to say that there is way more to pageants than the beauty aspect of it all. She said there is a sense of camaraderie among the participants and has made a lot of friends from the experience.
“There’s a lot of new contestants this year – a lot of contestants I haven’t met or seen before,” she said. “Just from online experiences, they all seem like such great people, so I can’t wait to see them in person.”
The participants all have platforms they promote to better their communities. Lindsley has a soft spot for shelter pets so her platform is called Kayley’s Cause for Paws, an initiative geared toward promoting pet adoptions through local animal shelters.
“I’ve grown up with them all my life – the first dog that I had was a shelter animal,” she said.
Last summer, Lindsley rescued a kitten from her car and took it to the shelter; when she got there, she was devastated to learn the shelter was full and she could not leave the kitten there. Luckily, Lindsley knew somebody who rehabilitated animals and the kitten is now thriving, but the experience gave Lindsley her “aha” moment.
“I realized that these shelters really need help and these animals really need to be adopted or fostered,” she said.
Through her platform, Lindsley collects and donates items to Berkeley Animal Center, and also promotes and participates in events organized by Friends of Berkeley Animal Center, an organization that supports the center.
Lindsley does other acts of service outside of her platform as well; she has collected and donated more than 250 books to the Little Free Library boxes around the Lowcountry. She also donates to local Blessing Boxes, and recently helped out at Moncks Corner Police Department’s first food drive.
The Little Miss and Teen South Carolina Pageant is a partner of Prisma Health Children’s Hospital, so Lindsley has made monetary and toy donations to support pediatric patients.
In addition to philanthropies, Lindsley said the organization is a big supporter of academics. Titleholders from the state pageant receive scholarship money. Last year, the organization gave out more than $37,000 in scholarships, according to its website.
At Berkeley High, Lindsley is an honors student who just took her first two AP classes this past year. Her best and favorite subject is English, and named her AP U.S. History teacher Doug Burges as her most influential teacher.
“He’s very passionate about his subject and that is something I admire about him,” she said. “I want to find something that I love that much to be able to push on generations of people.”
For all these reasons – the community service, the networking, the academics and just overall time and effort – Lindsley said there is more to the competition than meets the eye.
“There’s a lot of different elements that go into why you would want to be Teen Miss South Carolina,” she said. “It’s a lot of hard work but it is well worth it in the end.”
After high school, Lindsley is planning to go to the College of Charleston. She is still deciding between majors but is leaning toward marketing.
As she enters her final year at Berkeley High, Lindsley said the feeling is bittersweet. Lindsley loves her high school sports events and is an active varsity football cheerleader (she is also doing a lyrical dance for the talent portion of the pageant).
Lindsley said she loves seeing Stag pride at all the games.
“Just seeing how excited and ecstatic the crowd gets – it shows a lot of unity and togetherness,” she said. “It really does make me happy to see that.”
Lindsley is the daughter of Kacey and Sean Lindsley. In her downtime, Lindsley loves going to the beach and hanging out with friends.