Annette Addo-Yobo of North Texas has made history by being crowned Miss Texas 2024. The prestigious beauty pageant took place on Saturday night at the Charles W. Eisemann Center for Performing Arts in Richardson.
Addo-Yobo’s victory is noteworthy as she becomes the first immigrant-born and the first Ghanaian to win the title of Miss Texas. Running as Miss Southlake, she overcame strong competition to earn this honour.
Born in Ghana and raised in Canada and the U.S., Addo-Yobo pursued her education at the University of Texas at Dallas, earning a bachelor’s degree in psychology in 2020.
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In a heartfelt post on the “Miss Southlake” account, she recounted the challenges she faced due to her citizenship status, which hindered her from seizing many opportunities as a teenager and college student. It was only in 2022 that she received her U.S. citizenship.
Expressing her gratitude in an Instagram post, Addo-Yobo said she is “humbled, honored, and grateful” to be the 87th Miss Texas and looks forward to “continuing to make history with the Texas community and the Miss Texas class.”
Her triumph in the Miss Texas 2024 competition comes with a $20,000 scholarship and the chance to represent Texas in the Miss America pageant.
Addo-Yobo, who won the title of Miss Dallas in 2023 before, used the talent competition of the pageant to raise awareness of autism.
Her commitment to this cause was highlighted by her spoken word performance. She has been deeply involved in this since her younger brother Andrew was identified as having autism at the age of four.
“I want to bring autism safety, awareness, and education to the frontlines of our programming and our legislation. My younger brother Andrew had a large learning curve to overcome as an immigrant to this country,” Addo-Yobo said.
Winning the pageant has only fueled Addo-Yobo’s determination to use her platform, The SPARK Project, to confront the structural disadvantages that people with autism experience.
“As a sibling to someone on the spectrum, I noticed the systemic inequities and lack of education and training very early. It is my mission to amplify the voices of the autistic community and ensure that legislators, decision-makers, and community members see us and fight for us,” she added in her Instagram post.
Her Miss Southlake social media site features some of her earlier work, such as her efforts to raise autism awareness on Capitol Hill in March as the lone volunteer spokesperson for Autism Speaks.
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