CINCINNATI — With recent pageant title resignations making headlines, Miss Ohio is trying to change the trend. Stephanie Finoti became the first Latina to win the title of Miss Ohio. She says she's been working to bring more diversity to education. 

What You Need To Know

  • Stephanie Finoti became the first Latina to be name Miss Ohio in 2024, she competes for Miss America in January

  • She's also a biomedical science student at the University of Cincinnati and researcher and patient care assistant at Cincinnati Children's Hospital 

  • She started a non-profit to help mentor young girls and bring more diversity to career fields like hers

For Stephanie Finoti, it was a moment that changed history.

“I kept saying this isn’t real, this isn’t real, she said, yes you’re Miss Ohio,” said Finoti, “I couldn’t stop crying, I just kept saying thank you God, thank you God.”

She became the first Latina ever to be named Miss Ohio. It was a moment she’d only dreamed of as a little girl.

“I like to say I was destined for pageantry because my parents, they’re immigrants, so when my mom immigrated to the U.S. and she found out she was going to have a girl in the U.S. she wanted to do some research of what her daughter could do. One thing she came across on TV was the Miss America pageants,” said Finoti. 

When she’s not on stage, she turns in her crown for a pair of gloves and a lab coat doing something else she was told she couldn’t.

“I grew up in a low income community and telling my teachers I wanna grow up and be a doctor and being told you know we don’t have the resources to help you do that,” said Finoti. 

Now in college, she’s a biomedical science student at the University of Cincinnati, a patient care assistant at Children’s Hospital, and started a non-profit to create diversity in the field.

“I wanna take that into developing my masters in public health which I can use to incorporate with my non-profit organization, and I want it to feed into going to medical school,” said Finoti. 

On top of all of that, she’s a ballet dancer getting ready to compete for Miss America come January.

“When things get really hard or I feel like I wanna give up or I’m not enough, I could look back at this confetti and remember, I did that I am enough.”

She says her passion is getting more little girls like she was to realize their dreams, too.

“It really is how much work you’re willing to put into it and how much you’re willing to devote to make that dream become a reality,” said Finoti. 

Finoti is also volunteering to help. She’ll be doing lab demonstrations for elementary kids at the University of Cincinnati’s Safe Science Summit.