The annual Miss Hispanic DE Pageant has come to a close in the long tradition since 1972 of grouping young, community driven Latina’s from all parts of the great state of Delaware. The ages in this competition ranged from ages 16-19 and after a season of promoting the Latin community and awareness causes such as Anti-bullying to Drug Awareness and Violence, the community has spoken, choosing Amanda I. Glynn as their 2011 Miss Hispanic DE Queen.
Amanda is a 16 year old student of Cab Calloway School of Arts in Wilmington, DE who is sponsored by Orly Diamonds. Though her background heritage and representation is of Puerto Rico, she is proud to service and represent all Latin communities during her upcoming year of service.
This year offered a variety of contestants from singers, dancers, actresses, and more, offering a great show hosted by Nuestras Raices of DE, a non-profit organization that carries the annual tradition. This year event was held on the Main Stage of the Grand Opera House where crowds of all cultures came together to support the 11 contestants.
The event typically held in August leading up to Hispanic Heritage month takes on potential applicants year round and is driven to uplifting, motivating, and empowering young Latina’s to stay on track in school, establish goals, and most of all carry their cultural Latin Roots throughout their life.
List of winners:
Miss Congenitally- Amanda Glynn
Miss Photogenic -Ivonne Centeno DelAngel
3rd Runner-up- Glanelys Ortiz (Puerto Rico)
2nd Runner –up- Leandra Abreu (República Dominicana)
1st Runner-up- Ja’Lexis Nuñez (Mexico)
Queen – Amanda Glynn
Amanda I. Glynn
Platform: Child Abuse
Amanda Ivette Glynn is 16 years old. She was born in Newark Delaware, and is the daughter of Francis V. Glynn and Edna M. Diaz. She has two older siblings, Carlos and Ivette. She also has a stepmother Adrienne Goods and three stepsiblings, Travis, Erin and Eden. Amanda is a junior, majoring in dance at Cab Calloway School of Arts, she has been dancing since the age of four, her first dance studio was Diamond State Dancers and Cheerleaders, where she attended for eight years, then she attended Precision Dance Studio for four years. Amanda has been in the Young Choreographer Showcase, Show Stoppers and the High School Spring Show. She joined the Cheerleading team for Wilmington Charter School and also the Top Flight where she joined the Hip Hop team who were the 2011 State Champions. Amanda would like to continue dancing through collage and pursue her dream of becoming a dance choreographer and a dance instructor. One of her dreams is to be on Broadway and have a contract with a dance company. During her free time she loves to spend time with her friends and family. She is a fun and outgoing person and loves to meet new people. During this pageant Amanda’s platform Child Abuse. Amanda wants to thank all those who have supported her, she wants to give special thanks her parents who have motivated and supported her to pursue her dreams.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #1
Brenda Enid Roldan
Platform: Teen Pregnancy
Brenda Enid Roldan is 16 years old. She was born February 1st 1995. She is currently in the 10th grade and attends Delcastle Technical High School. One of Brenda’s goals is to attend college to be a Dental Hygienist. Some of Brenda’s favorite past time are modeling and acting. She has taken modeling training at Barbizon Academy and AMTC (Actors, Models & Talent for Christ) in Delaware and also in Maritza Medina Modeling School in Puerto Rico. Another one of her favorite things to do is public speaking and spending time with her friends and family. She is a very talented and an outgoing young lady who works hard to achieve all her goals in life.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #2
Marlennys Rivera
Platform: Bullying
Marlennys Rivera –Figueroa is 16 year old and the daughter of Waleska Figueroa and Rolando Rivera. She is a junior attending Conrad Schools Of Sciences. She is currently enrolled in the Nursing Field at Conrad. She has one younger sibling named Rolando Rivera Jr. She was born in Bayamon, in the beautiful island of Puerto Rico, and moved to the U.S when she was 5 years old. She is a cheerleader at her school. Marlenny is a very caring, responsible, outgoing and generous person. Education is very important to her and has been a Honor Roll student since the 4th grade. She wants to go to college to become a Nurse and her ultimate dream is to become a pediatrician. Her father is a musician and has inspired her interest in music. She began playing the violin in elementary school. Then, she played the saxophone in the 7th grade. Recently, her father began to teach her how to play the Puerto Rican instrument called the “Cuatro” he made especially for her. Marlenny is very excited to be participating in the Miss Hispanic Delaware Pageant this year!
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #3
Minellie Gonzalez
Platform: Teen Pregnancy
Minellie Gonzalez Santos is 18 years old and was born in Yauco Puerto Rico. Her parents are Miguel Angel Gonzales and Nelida Santos. Minellie is a senior at Thomas McKean High School. She enjoys playing basketball, cross-country and the track clubs at her High School. Some of her favorite subjects are Drama and Student Leaders, because they allow her to practice her acting and leadership skills. She has received numerous awards during her High School career, such as 3 awards for her participation in basketball, crosscountry and track. Also, she received 8 caught redhanded awards which are awards given when a student makes positive contributions to the school community. Minellie comes from a big and united family, her grandparents made a great role in her life. Her goal in life is to accomplish all her dreams, including going to college and becoming a teacher and to major and acting. She is very excited to be the first in her family to go to college. She hopes to be someone that her parents can be very proud of. She wants to prove that you can do anything you set your heart and mind to and find happiness where nobody else would dare go.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #4
Lisbeth Margarita
Platform: Breast Cancer
Lisbeth Margarita Santos is 16 years old. She is originally from San Francisco de Macoris in the Dominican Republic and has been residing in Wilmington, Delaware for almost 5 years. Currently she is in the 10th grade, attending Alexis I. Dupont High School. Her short-term goal is to successfully finish high school. Then, her dream is to have a Doctorate in Family Psychotherapy. She has won many different awards including perfect attendance, honor roll, excellence award for Spanish, excellence award for Accounting 2, recognition award from Science, Social Study, Computers, English and distinguish honors. Her favorite hobbies are playing basketball, dancing, listening to music, cooking, and spending time with family and friends. Her platform at this pageant is Brest cancer.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #5
Glenda Salhuana
Platform: Immigration
Glenda Salhuana is 16 years old and is originally from Peru. Glenda is the daughter of Carmen and Carlos Salhuana. She is currently a senior at Glasgow High School. Her favorite subjects are; ROTC, French and Spanish class. She believes that although today’s society is led by popularity, power, appearance, and money, the most
important thing in life is love, family and following your dreams. Her mind is set to pursue her passion of becoming a lawyer in the near future, to be able to lead by example. Her biggest inspiration is her little sister to whom she would like to be a role model for and motivates her to always try hard at everything she does. Glenda moved to the United States at the age of 9. Her first goal was learning how to speak English and exceed in school. She is determined to accomplish all her goals. During her free time, she enjoys playing soccer, dancing, singing and doing community service. She enjoys helping people and animals. She would like to thank her parents Carmen and Carlos for all the hard work they put in to raising her little sister Katherine and her, as well as everyone else that have always been there supporting all her choices.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #6
Jasmyn Rose
Platform: Immigration
Jasmyn Rose Rivera is 16 years old. She has been living in Delaware since she was 3 years old. Jasmyn is representing the island of Puerto Rico. She is the daughter of Rosa Beltran, who is her hero and is from Corozal Puerto Rico. Jasmyn lives with her mother and sisters Beatriz and Damarilis. She gets to spend time with her father Roberto Rivera on the weekends. On her father side she has two sisters, with her being the youngest. On her father’s side she has five sisters and two brothers and Jasmyn is the middle child. She is a very outgoing person once you get to know her. She likes to have fun, She loves being with her family and her close friends. Jasmyn is currently a 10th grader at Thomas McKean High School. Jasmyn is into her schoolwork and enjoys playing sports. She plans plan on going to college for autopsy. The platform she would be representing during this pageant is immigration.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #7
Ivonne Centeno
Platform: Teen Pregnancy
Ivonne Centeno Del Angel is 17 years old and is originally from Mexico. She lives in Bear, Delaware with her loving parents Felipe and Patricia Centeno. She studies Marketing at Pencader Charter High School. Her aspiration in life includes being a psychiatrist or a pediatrician. Ivonne has successfully maintained a grade point average of 3.8 during her school career. She believes that being responsible with her schoolwork will help her achieve a strong base for her future career. During her free time she enjoys exercising and learning everything about health and beauty, so much that she is currently studying at Barbizon. The most important thing to Ivonne is her family that she respects and admires.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #8
Leandra Abreu
Platform: Bullying
Leandra Abreu is 19 years old and is representing the Dominican Republic. She is the daughter of Rafael and Sandra Abreu and is the second oldest of five sisters. Leandra is known to be social, intelligent, outgoing and full of life. She is a sophomore at Delaware State University studying Fashion Merchandising with a Minor of Public Relations. Leandra earned a 3.8 grade point average and was awarded with the Dean’s List. She is devoted to her education and is passionate in helping out her community. Over the years, she has been affiliated with various groups including Brothers and Sisters’ Student Union, where she was awarded the Leadership award and participated in a multicultural event called international day for two years. She was a member in Key Club, Hispanic Youth Group, Aspira, and is an active member in Latino Student Association. In addition, Leandra devoted two summers volunteering over 110 hours at the Christiana Hospital. During her senior year of high school, she was unanimously positioned to be Editor-in- Chief of the yearbook, anchor for her school’s televised morning news broadcast, called “NEWARK LIVE”, and went on to be crowned Prom Queen of her high school class. In addition to that, Leandra was accepted into an Intensive Summer Program at the Parson’s New School of Design in NY where she designed and constructed her own dress, which went on display in a dress exhibit. Outside of school, she was featured in the May issue of Hoy en Delaware as the Chica de Hoy, modeled on print ads, local television programs, fashion shows, and was cast to talk on the radio regarding her pride for her Dominican Heritage. Furthermore, Leandra’s platform in this pageant is School Bullying.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #9
Glanelys Ortiz
Platform: High School Drop Outs
Glanelys Ortiz was born June 17, 1995 in Wilmington, Delaware. She is 16 years old and attends Alexis I. DuPont High School. Her friends and family call her Nelly. She comes from a big family of 5 including her to include two younger siblings. Her mother, a native of Naranjito, Puerto Rico, is Glenalys Ortiz and her father, Waldemar Ortiz is from Catano, Puerto Rico. Her platform is to promote awareness and prevention for high school dropouts. She feels that this is important as they are the next closest generation to shaping our society. Glanelys future goals are to graduate from high school and then attend Florida State to pursue her passion for becoming a pediatrician. Her involvement in the activities and community ventures from playing softball with the Roberto Clemente League, to volunteering hours at the local Latin American Community Center to work with young kids. As a student, she serves with academic excellence in her school environment and is known for her captivating personality most recently having won Homecoming princess this past freshman year. If crowned, Glanelys looks forward to using the title to help her promote her platform and serve as a great role model to younger females.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #10
Ja’Lexis Nuñez
Platform: Promoting Healthy Dietary Habbits & Eating Disorder Awareness
Ja’Lexis Nuñez was born on August 7th, 1994 in Los Angeles, California. Ja’Lex is in advanced placement and honor student, at William Penn High School in New Castle, Delaware. She is looking into attending Penn State or New York university for Pre-Law. She is trilingual, she speaks English, French and Spanish. At only 12 years of age, Ja’Lexis suffered a detrimental 3-year battle with a severe eating disorder. Since her recovery, she has become very passionate about raising awareness on the importance of good dietary habits and positive self-image. She hopes to turn her tragic experience into something positive through creating hope and courage in others, especially young ladies who are often misguided by media into unrealistic ideas of perfection in today’s society. Ja’Lexis has always wanted to create a strong impact in the world, and being crowned Miss Hispanic Delaware would be an honor and privilege in Ja’Lexis’s Journey to achieving her life’s aspiration. Ja’Lexis has an innumerable number of talents and passions, these include singing, writing, acting and modeling. At 14 Ja’Lexis attended a Modeling school and immediately fell in love with Modeling, she has since then modeled in countless fashion shows and participated in many photo shoots for well known photographers and designers. Ja’Lexis works with a lot of heart and passion in hopes that one day her dreams of becoming a trademark model will come true. She is a fighter and a dreamer. She believes that the worst thing you can do in life is give up on your dreams, because dreams are what life is fueled of. Ja’Lexis’s words to the world: “You are never too young or
to old to chase your dreams, have faith, passion and courage and just run after them”.
2011 Miss Hispanic Delaware Contestant #11
Amanda I. Glynn
Platform: Child Abuse
Amanda Ivette Glynn is 16 years old. She was born in Newark Delaware, and is the daughter of Francis V. Glynn and Edna M. Diaz. She has two older siblings, Carlos and Ivette. She also has a stepmother Adrienne Goods and three stepsiblings, Travis, Erin and Eden. Amanda is a junior, majoring in dance at Cab Calloway School of Arts, she has been dancing since the age of four, her first dance studio was Diamond State Dancers and Cheerleaders, where she attended for eight years, then she attended Precision Dance Studio for four years. Amanda has been in the Young Choreographer Showcase, Show Stoppers and the High School Spring Show. She joined the Cheerleading team for Wilmington Charter School and also the Top Flight where she joined the Hip Hop team who were the 2011 State Champions. Amanda would like to continue dancing through collage and pursue her dream of becoming a dance choreographer and a dance instructor. One of her dreams is to be on Broadway and have a contract with a dance company. During her free time she loves to spend time with her friends and family. She is a fun and outgoing person and loves to meet new people. During this pageant Amanda’s platform Child Abuse. Amanda wants to thank all those who have supported her, she wants to give special thanks her parents who have motivated and supported her to pursue her dreams.
