Lauren appeals for votes for Miss Student competition

Lauren, who was born in Bexhill, has been singing and dancing since she was three years old and has been a devoted member of the East Sussex School of Performing Arts (ESSPA) since the age of seven.

Now aged 18, she is a student at Colchester Institute of Music and Performing Arts, taking a three year BA degree course in Musical Theatre.

She explained that in order to enter the Miss Student competition and represent their universities, students had to be nominated by their peers.

She said:" Basically the competition is open to any girl over the age of eighteen from any university in the country; it's all about working hard, your community involvement with uni groups, your personality and how you are accepted into the student uni community and being an overall good student."

Lauren began appealing for votes from friends and family when the competition commenced last November.

She went through to the regional finals, which were held in Chelmsford, with sixteen other girls. Only four were selected to go through to the next round, based on both texted and judges votes, and Lauren, having impressed the judges with her talent, was one of the lucky ones.

She said: "I won the judges vote because when they realised I was studying musical theatre they asked me to sing on the stage, which I did and they gave me top marks for spontaneity and overall energy."

Lauren said she is facing some stiff competition with sixty other girls currently in the running and, even though at the moment she is ranked a respectable 16th place, only 12 girls will be selected to go through to the final 'talent' round and she is appealing for people to support her by texting the competition to vote for her.

She said: "I just want to get through to the grand final in June. Basically I need to be in the top twelve with text votes as the top twelve go through to the judges round. Once you are in the top twelve the text votes are over and it's then all down to the judges decision. I just need to get a few places higher as I know I will excel in the talent round as I have had some brilliant training from all the staff at ESSPA."

Along with a grand prize of 10,000 the winner will also receive a european holiday for two and a modelling shoot with a top model agency.

Lauren said if she wins she plans to further her education and use the money to pay the fees for a post grad course in performing arts.

Modestly she said: "I'm doing this because I want people to see that whilst all the other girls in the competition are all beautiful and stunning, I'm not exactly a size eight or a catwalk model. I'm basically going out there as a student who has fun, works hard, and still achieves what she wants to achieve - and it would be really nice to win."

To vote for Lauren or for more information on the competition visit www.missstudent.com.