Air Force Academy, Miss America, and Harvard University | Madison Marsh

In Episode 11, we meet Madison Marsh: a graduate of the United States Air Force Academy, Miss America 2024, and a Master of Public Policy candidate at Harvard Kennedy School.

Madison shares her journey from military service to the Miss America stage and reflects on how losing her mother to pancreatic cancer inspired her to found the Whitney Marsh Foundation - an organization dedicated to supporting pancreatic cancer patients and advancing research. Throughout her journey, Madison has broken barriers and redefined what it means to be a woman in STEM, service, and on stage.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to the Beyond Harvard Podcast, a podcast that shares the stories of students at Harvard University, uncovering who they are here and beyond. On this week's episode, we have Madison Marsh. Madison, welcome to Beyond Harvard.

SPEAKER_00 0:20

Thank you so much for having me. I'm super excited for today.

SPEAKER_01 0:22

I am so excited to have you, Madison. You're a total force to be reckoned with. You're currently a public policy candidate at Harvard Kennedy School, and you're graduating in in a couple of weeks. And so I want to get into your whole journey, but maybe to start, Madison, I'd love to know in your own words, who is Madison Marsh?

SPEAKER_00 0:43

Oh gosh, what a packed question off the bat. So I grew up, I was born and raised in Arkansas my entire life, and I grew up really loving anything science related. If you were to ask me probably every couple of months as a kid what I wanted to do. When I was older, it was uh I wanted to be a volcanologist, archaeologist, marine biologist, I wanted to live in forests with gorillas. I thought like I came up with a lot of really random stuff. Um, and then by the time I was about in the eighth grade, I really, really wanted to be an astronaut. My parents sent me off to space camp and I got to uh be there and really formulate what my life looks like now. Um and so that is what led me to go to the Air Force Academy. I started flying planes when I was in high school, then ended up uh commissioning from the Air Force Academy, and my very first station was getting to come here to Harvard. Um and the reason that I decided to come here was because my senior year of high school, I lost my mom to pancreatic cancer. And that was obviously a really, really big turning point in my life, and having to struggle and deal with that grief of losing a parent and trying to make something out of it. So I started the Whitney Marsh Foundation with my family as a high schooler and then decided while I was at the Air Force Academy that I wanted to figure out how to bring that to a different scale in the policy space, which is what led me here. And then I had a weird year in between my first and second year at Harvard where I got to serve as Miss America. So that's the short summation of my life life thus far.

SPEAKER_01 2:10

Incredible. I mean, it you have there's so many facets to you, Madison, and I'm excited to get into all of the different eras of of your life, um from kind of the worlds of military to pageantry to policy. To start, Madison, I'd love to learn a little bit more about your your time at the Air Force Academy. Um what that what was that like? What was the impetus to join the forces and um what was your experience like?

SPEAKER_00 2:37

It's very hard. Um but I got a free degree out of it and a husband. So both great. Both great. Um I the whole reason I came there is because I wanted to be an astronaut. And so when I found out about the Air Force Academy when I was a lot younger, like about in the eighth grade, uh, you when you start to hear some of these astronaut stories, you hear some of the same stuff like military, fighter pilot, test pilot. So I created this 20 to 30 year long plan for myself when I was 13. And it was that I was gonna go to the Air Force Academy, I was gonna study astronautical engineering, become a pilot, become an Air Force pilot, a fighter pilot, a test pilot, and then be the first woman on Mars. Or the first person on Mars. So that was that was this whole crazy plan. And this is when you were 13? Yes, this is when I went to this is when I went to space camp. I was like, this is what I'm gonna do. You went to space camp? Yes. So I loved, loved all of that, then went to the Air Force Academy to start that dream, and then didn't realize until my senior year that I was there that I didn't want to do it anymore. But that was kind of what led me to be there. The experience is super unique. Uh if you don't know much about the Air Force Academy, it's just like a normal four-year college. Like you're getting a normal degree, but you're in uniform all the time, so you have military duties, uh, you have all these different weird things that you do because you're still a military member, you're getting yelled at, you live, you live uh as a unit for all four years and co-ed dorms. So it's a very uh different, unique experience that's not only giving you a top-notch education, uh, but is also preparing you in a leadership sense to be an officer once you graduate. So lots of cool, weird experiences the entire time. I mean, there are things I know my husband now, uh his summer programs, it's one of the few places in the world where the first time you jump out of a plane, you do it solo. Uh, you teach cadets to fly planes. Uh we have all these different programs, D1 athletic programs, uh, to get people to have all of these different really unique college experiences while preparing to be a leader at a young age. So it was incredible. If you were to ask me as a freshman, would I have said it was incredible? No, I probably would have had some other more choice words uh those first couple of years. But now looking back on it as a graduate, it is seriously one of the most special places of my life, and I the bonds that I formed there are likely unlike any other that I will have for the rest of my life. So I hold it very near and dear to my heart, and I have a lot of love for the place.

SPEAKER_01 5:06

That's very powerful. And I'm curious to know, Madison. I mean, you mentioned it's it's a unique and different experience. Was that something that you were seeking when you were looking for for where you wanted to be in college? And then as you reflect on it, reflect on it now. I know you mentioned year one was tough, but what were some of kind of those those learnings and and takeaways that you took from from the academy?

SPEAKER_00 5:30

Well, I I don't know if I necessarily sought out to have a different experience per se. Okay. It was just like the dream. It was like this is my number one place that I want to go to because I know it has everything that I could need to propel me for the rest of my career. Uh the career that I wanted at the time to be able to do. This goes back to that 20-year plan. Yes. It had everything that I had wanted, but what I didn't realize is that there is obviously you're making these decisions as like a 17-year-old when you're applying to college, right? Uh and there's so much that you have yet to learn about the world. And I know even now I'm turning 25 this summer, I I still have so much, right, that I don't know about the world yet and haven't gotten to learn. But I think the Air Force Academy, what was really great about it is no matter what your plan is or what plan you come in with, there are so many skills that you can adapt and translate to just about anything in life. I mean, the ability to teach resilience at such a young age. Yeah, how do you react when you get hit in the face? Genuinely you get hit in the face. Because not other people. We have to box each other. I got hit in the face for the first time. Uh so how do you react in situations like that? Or not so literally, how do you react when things go wrong? You can't control things. When life sucks, what's your reaction going to be? Uh and so I had to learn uh and struggle through that for a long time of how do I still create a good attitude out of something that sucks and isn't fun? Um, and learning how to balance a thousand things at once. I feel like every day there I had 48 hours worth of work to do and I had 24 hours to get it done, right? And they teach you to be able to balance and perform under pressure, which is why uh everything in life that comes after that, I'm always going to lean back on those skills. Yeah. And even like in translation to Harvard, I did physics my entire undergrad. So I was doing like research with NASA and gamma ray burst research, and then decided I didn't want to be a physicist forever. But those skills directly translated into me getting to do the work that I wanted to do here at the Kennedy School. And how do I use those uh those problem-solving skills, that scientific side, to now use that in policy work. That's in my that's kind of what my entire uh thesis at the Kennedy School revolved around how did I use those skills that I learned in physics with computer programming to be able to use that and do coding here for cancer research and being able to translate that into qualitative research. Like none of my life that I have now, even Miss America, could have ever happened without the skills and the people I gained at the academy.

SPEAKER_01 8:09

That's incredible. I'm I'm so curious to learn more about that that pivot Madison from physics to policy because these seem like quite separate worlds. Yes. And you managed to traverse both. So I'm I'm curious to know, do you see are there a lot of parallels between the two areas? And and also curious to learn more about kind of what drew you to policy.

SPEAKER_00 8:34

I don't know if there's actually a lot of legitimate parallels. I mean, three years ago I was doing quantum mechanics and thermo, which has literally nothing to do with what I'm doing now. Yeah. But I think it's the soft skill translation. And if you look hard enough, I whenever you hear people say, like, oh, I want to change my job, but like none of this is gonna translate or it's just not gonna work. I think you really can look for those lessons if you look hard enough. Um and I think all of the some of those soft skills of problem solving, dedication, uh, those sorts of pieces are what can relate to public policy. And I think the problem solving piece is very real. Problem solving is going to look obviously different. It's not gonna be like solve this equation for some quantum dynamic or electromagnetic problem that you're being given on an exam, but instead, now is how do you continue to proke and prod at a problem to find the root issue? And I and I saw that come to life with my pink rate at cancer work and in the policy world about it's usually sometimes not going to be as simple of an answer to do X. Because when you look at like passing one policy, what are going to be all of the things that could come after that that could go wrong or that could go right? What are the implications of that? Do we need to take a step back to now problem solve that potential problem that is going to come? So getting able to use that problem solving process that I developed as a STEM major really helped me be more thorough in how I would even conduct policy change on this side with the cancer world and within nonprofits.

SPEAKER_01 10:14

Interesting. That's fascinating. I'm curious, could you just take us back, Madison, in terms of how the moment in which you decided I don't want to do physics and and kind of pursue that world anymore and wanted to pivot to policy. How did you make that decision?

SPEAKER_00 10:29

It was uh probably over the course of several years for me. I remember so to to backtrack a little bit, I found out I got into the Air Force Academy the night before my mom passed away from pancreatic cancer. So I actually got the call from my congressman saying I got in based off of some early admissions program. So one of the very last things that I told my mom was that I was gonna go to the Air Force Academy and that even though she wasn't gonna get to be there to see it, this was this whole life plan I was going to follow for myself. I was gonna go to the academy because I had just gotten in. That first step was complete, and here was how I was gonna lay out the rest of my life. And then she passed away later that morning. So come time when I'm at the academy, I'm holding so tight to this dream that I have outgrown because I felt like I owed it to my mom, right? Because it was one of the last things I told her. I felt like I owed it to my advisors, the ones that had helped me on this dream that I had had for myself, that it was really hard to let go because I made it my identity instead of figuring out what my real identity was and making my career fit into that. I did it the reverse way, which can be, I think, kind of harmful, especially I feel like at a young age, you're you're chasing all of these things, and sometimes it's hard to let go and be honest with yourself. So it wasn't until probably my junior or senior year, and my husband was actually the one that started to catch on to this because I was applying for all of these scholarship programs. So I was in like the Truman and Rhodes cohort while I was at USAFA, and every time that I was having to give these questions an interview and practicing with my husband and my coaches, they were everyone was just saying, It sounds like you're just pressing play like a robot when we ask about your plan on the astronaut path. But when we talk about your nonprofit and this work and other leadership in the military, that's when we see you genuinely light up. What's up with that? And I think for a long time I had said, like, that's that's just because I've been practicing so much and there's nothing more to that. Um and I remember finally I was we were actually sitting in a Chipotle parking lot uh one of the nights, and um, I believe my dad actually called me earlier that day and had said, I want you to know your mom wouldn't be more proud of you because you continued down this path. What she would be mad at you at is if you didn't live a life that you loved. So don't try to force yourself into a path if you don't actually love it, because that's when she would have been mad at you. Not because you gave up this dream. That's not what she cared about. You could have, he was like, you could do anything in life and she would still be happy and proud of you. And giving myself that space to say, like, this just isn't the life that I want to live anymore, and that's okay. And having that, and I think making that decision and then the time that I actually came to terms with that probably was like took me four years. Maybe until this year, when I actually finally gave up my pilot slot and I switched my career to really feel matured enough to accept that that dream is now outgrown, and I'm leaving that behind, and that doesn't make my current career still special and meaningful, and trying to uh communicate that with other people as well, so that if they're struggling through that same thing to know it's never too late to change your career, to try to find something that you love and you're passionate about, because it's not just about like chase your passions, but also about I believe you can create more good in the world if we do what we're called to do versus doing what we're forcing ourselves to do or what someone else wants us to do. I think we can create so much more good in society if we try as much as we can to align those passions with our strengths to deliver a meaningful life for ourselves, but also to provide more meaning for other people. Because I think it's really easy to half do a job or go only 60% when you're really not mentally or your heart's not in it. I appreciate your candor there, Addison.

SPEAKER_01 14:29

Thank you so much for for sharing that because I I think I mean you're spot on. I think sometimes we we we say things when we're younger almost, you know, frivolously and and kind of and then we end up being married to those dreams, and it can be hard to detach, right? And and say that you your interests have evolved or your passions have evolved. Um what was it about the policy and and the nonprofit side that that made makes your heart light up and and why that was so much more exciting for you than the physics or the passion?

SPEAKER_00 15:01

Yeah. Sorry to Dr. Anderson if he's listening. That was another side advisor. Um I think when I was getting to do my pancreatic cancer work, I got to see a direct impact with the patients and the families that I was working with. And so it made that come to life for me to to see that direct impact. Like every hour that I work on this nonprofit or this policy, that's a potential family that could be saved from having to go through that grief of losing a loved one like my family did. And that to me brought it to life in ways that physics just couldn't for me. Um and so now looking towards how I utilize policy and why HKS, I really wanted to lean more into how can I use my skills that I have in science and really being able to understand some of these technicalities behind cancer, marry that with my real life experience of being a loved one of a patient, now to bringing that together to effectuate change throughout the United States or even throughout local communities. Because there is so much that can be done. And so when looking for institutions, the Kennedy School was one of the best of the best to learn for public policy and making that sort of change. So it was a very easy choice when it was it was clear in my mind that HKS was going to be my number one school. So I felt incredibly grateful and lucky to actually get to attend here and now finally getting to graduate in just a couple of weeks. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:32

That is so exciting. And Madison, you get paid to go to school here at at the Kennedy School, right? It's almost your your obligation because you're a Truman scholar. Could you share a little bit more about what what that's like and and how you found out about this scholarship? Um a good portion of our our audience are prospective students, you might be interested in in pursuing pathways in higher education. So curious to learn a little bit more about once you've decided you wanted to want to pursue policy. How did you think about it from actually navigating the process as an applicant?

SPEAKER_00 17:04

So my school program is actually a little bit different from Truman's. So Okay. When you come typically as uh as an officer or a military member, your school you're not allowed to pay for yourself or take out loans. Traditionally, now it might have changed since I've come in. So uh and so while I'm here, one, I'm not paying for school, and then the military actually pays you. Um that's like this is like your duty station, if that makes sense. Um not sure things might be changing, but in terms of the Truman Scholarship, that is a $30,000 scholarship for public servants. And sometimes uh you can use that scholarship and then apply within other programs, maybe at Harvard or other schools, to supplement and cover the rest of your tuition, uh, which is what I had done my first year. So for the Truman Scholarship, it is a national scholarship that was set up uh in honor of President Truman, and it is for public servants. So obviously that can have a wide range and definition. And you'll start applying, I believe, about your junior year of college, and there are requirements as to how long you serve in public service after you use your uh scholarship assistance. Uh I can't remember those exact numbers right now, but it is a it's a fun competitive uh scholarship that goes across the nation. You at least at the Air Force Academy, we started competing amongst the Academy at first, and then once they had selected who was going to be allowed to start applying for Truman, then you apply and you're under your state, you compete against everyone in your state, and then they select at least, I believe at least one from every state across the country. Uh and then afterwards you get to have a fun weekend together, or it's I think it's like a whole week. It's like the Truman week, where you where you go, you meet all these people from across the nation, uh, you get to do service projects together, you actually start working on, I think we did some like policy simulations, and I believe ours was a it was globally about instituting educational programs in the Middle East, I believe. And so we had like a day or two to formulate, do the research, create debates, all the different policy things, and then present it. So you do that, and then once you apply to schools, you can utilize those depending on um if you meet the requirements and the criteria for public service. So public service, public service, public service. It's all about giving back to the US in some capacity, and so there's a plethora of ways that you can uh go about that. And I think outside of just the money, um, the name that comes along and the community that comes along with the Truman Scholarship is worth so much more than money can even define. Um and it's incredible getting to see these people going on afterwards to be Rhodes and Marshall scholars, they're uh institutions all across the globe, um, and even some of my other fellow military members and the impact that you get to have um within this community and service in whatever way that means to you. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 20:05

It's it's such a prestigious scholarship, Madison, and so congrats to you on it. Um and and that's how how you part of how you ended up here at the Kennedy School. And so I'm curious to now learn a little bit more about your your time here. I know you're graduating in in a few weeks, but um maybe share with us a little bit about your your journey here at the Kennedy School and and what it's like being a public policy student now.

SPEAKER_00 20:30

It's been a lot of fun. It's very different from the academy. Uh I'm not getting yelled at while I'm here. Um it wasn't all yelling at yourself, I'm just making the thing. But um I think one of the the coolest experiences that I've had here was what we call our policy analysis exercise, which is kind of like a thesis, but they don't call it a thesis, I believe. Uh and we I've gotten to do that for about this entire past year. So mine was all about uh improving survival for pancreatic cancer patients through access to surgery. Surgery is one of the biggest pieces uh you can't survive without surgery as a pancreatic cancer currently. Um so, and only about 20% of pancreatic cancer patients are even eligible because most patients get diagnosed so late. And then within that eligibility bucket, uh there's been estimates that show maybe even less than half of those eligible patients ever end up even receiving surgery. Half of the 20%. So my goodness. Our problem that we saw was how do we improve survival through other means than just doing research, right? Because there's tons of research constantly trying to find those breakthroughs, and that can take a really, really long time. And in the meantime, what are we doing to improve that survival for patients? So I got to do this project, and one of the first pieces was I took 20 years of NCI data to look at different sociodemographic characteristics on uh are is there are there any characteristics that show patient patients are less likely to receive surgery and controlling for all of these factors? Then, through Harvard funding, I was actually able to go travel to Colorado and I shadowed a clinic for multiple days. They're one of the biggest in the, or not one of the biggest, but they are one of the best institutions across the United States and they're a multidisciplinary clinic. So I got to watch everything from patients showing up, talking about their diagnosis with their the nurses for the very first time. I got to watch uh what their clinic does. So basically, patients will come in in the morning, they see people, they get all their workups done, and then in the afternoon, there's an entire room full of surgeons, oncologists, social workers, any person that needs to be a part of this plan, and they will lay out and immediately decide then uh here's here's how long we suggest being on chemo radiation for, this is what we want to do surgery. Uh, then the social worker essentially afterwards will ensure uh what government assistance programs do they uh do they fall under? Are there any personal hospital programs that they fall under? We're actually currently in the process of uh doing non-medical funding for patients at these hospitals so that if they need travel covered, uh they need gas cards, they need hotels, they need flights for their families, we will cover those. So I got to watch all of that and see their entire process. And then the second piece was I actually got to go to Germany, to the Heidelberg Center. Uh and they are one of the highest volume centers around the globe. Uh I think second only to one that's in Beijing. Okay. They perform over 700 of these a year.

unknown 23:31

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 23:31

So I got to sit in with their surgeons, again, oncologists, their social workers, every person that could be a part of this chain. And then I think one of the coolest experiences was on the second day, they were like, uh, let's go scrub you up. And I was like, scrub up for what? And then they were like, Well, if you want to come watch, we're gonna, you can come watch the whiple procedures and the procedures that are actually removing these tumors from the pancreatic cancer patients. I've never seen a surgery before in my life. Uh so I was a little worried because some of them they're doing robotic surgeries, which was really, really cool. You're watching the surgeons in the corner like doing this, and you're looking at the little robots on the screens. Then I saw some of them that were completely open abdomen. And I was really worried I was gonna faint. And as you're saying it, I'm like, oh my god. I was very worried I was gonna faint. And they were like, here, step up on this stool and look into this person's stomach. Like, they're like holding up intestines and stuff. And I was sitting there and they were like, Don't worry, the anesthesiologist is there to catch you if you pass out. And I was like, what if I pass out forward? Into the I was I was so nervous, but I ended up not passing out. It was really cool. And then afterwards, after they removed the tumor, I got to hold this person's pancreas and their tumor. I got to hold the spleen, which looks really weird, all the lymph nodes that they removed. They told me they were like, here, put gloves on. And once again, I was like, Gloves on for what? Because I knew it would be I knew it'd be suspicious this time. And they were like, here, you can pick it up. And I was just I was so worried because I was like, this feels so wrong. Like I'm literally holding someone's organ right now. But it was so cool.

SPEAKER_01 25:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:13

I I don't know what I thought a tumor looked like. I thought it would look like a really specific black spot for like a like a pancreatic cancer tumor. Um but it just feels like like a hard ball. Like when you it it doesn't at least it didn't visually look super different to me, but it just feels like it just feels kind of like a hard piece of plastic or something. But it was really cool. So I got to do that while I was here.

SPEAKER_01 25:38

Oh my goodness. So you really had like the end-to-end experience from everything from meeting with patients and and sort of the the front end part of it to then really going in sort of the the back end and actually like seeing that behind the scenes, which is so so I mean I I'm curious to know like what especially being there in in the room and kind of holding or like seeing the the open abdomen and like holding the tumor. What did what did you take away from that experience? Like I'm curious to know, did that have a a shift on how you approach the the work that you're doing, or maybe not a shift on the work that I do, but a shift in appreciation.

SPEAKER_00 26:17

I think it's hard to realize what these people do and the amount of training that goes, I mean, these are some of the most complex surgeries, right?

SPEAKER_01 26:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:29

And the training that has to be done, why high volume is so important, and seeing them make these decisions like live, saying, uh, okay, now we're actually in here, and it looks like the tumor might be wrapped too much around this artery, we need to bring in the head surgeon. Uh, do you think that we should proceed? And making those decisions live, and you are literally sitting there watching a patient's life be saved, hopefully, right? Yeah, and it is it it was life-changing. And then the second day, or one of the third days, I asked if I could go back down there to go watch some surgery. Oh, you wanted to go back. I actually ended up loving it. I thought it was just so surreal. It was so surreal. Seeing the in seeing the inside of a human body is very surreal. And it made me think, I hope I don't ever have to get any sort of surgery that I'm opened up because now that I know what it looks like and what they're doing, that is I think that would mess with me a little bit. But but it was so cool, and I went back the second day and I watched a completely different surgery, and I got to see the human heart beating. I got to see lungs. And to see that sort of life force was very humanizing to myself of just Yeah. I I I guess I don't often walk around thinking that I'm like this bag of organs. Essentially, yes. And it and it made me just feel like there is so much to life, and I feel like this is how I felt like looking, like I still love astronomy and like looking at the stars, and I feel like even looking at something like that really humanizes this experience of how big we make our problems and maybe how small they might actually be. And the same thing looking at a human body just gave me one, so much appreciation, but also two, just like I need to go out and see more things and and do more and be more and be around more people. That's that's kind of how that entire experience left me feeling.

unknown 28:20

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 28:21

And what I'm seeing, what I'm hearing too, Madison, is there is almost like this connection between the uh astronomy side and and perhaps the healthcare side in terms of how it makes you feel. Yes. Right?

SPEAKER_00 28:33

Like I think like the day-to-day or the practical work might be different, but uh uh sort of those feelings are like thinking about how uh uh you know expansive this uh or this systems that that we are in and and forcing you to kind of almost humanizing as you as you said, or kind of it's it's it seems like both humbling, but also like there is a connection there between like makes you feel like it made me feel wonder, you know, getting to see that and then just getting to see like the stars or any of the projects that I worked on, like it just made me feel wonder for the world, which I guess it's like a little cheesy, but it is but it was really, really cool and life-changing for sure.

SPEAKER_01 29:15

Yeah, that's so exciting. Um I wanna get into Madison. During your your time here at the Kennedy School, you competed in in Miss America. So I want to get into pageantry as well. Um I I know I I share this with you, but I before I met you on campus, I remember seeing you on TV and I was like, oh my goodness, it was so cool. Um I think this was back in 2024. Yes. When you so could you just one I want to learn a little bit more about that experience, but beforehand too, what what made you choose to pursue the world of of pageants? It does seem quite different than you know the the world that you were coming from with with a background in military and physics. And so um I I love that you're you're breaking stereotypes with kind of going and being able to so effectively shuffle between these worlds. And so I'm curious to learn a little bit more about the impetus to pursue pageantry.

SPEAKER_00 30:08

So I started competing my freshman year at the academy, actually. And between my fall and spring semester, it was because my cousin was competing in them. And when you're a freshman, you don't have any civilian clothes ever. It's just you're f you're in uniform all the time. So there's different uniforms for like obviously stuff that's comfortable to sleep in. But you they they essentially like take away that identity to to build you back up as a team. So there's a purpose to it, but it was also very, very hard. Uh and so I wanted to do something that was like a fun side hobby that I did. And also, interestingly enough, there's a lot of public speaking in pageants. Yeah. Tons of public speaking and a lot of community service. And so I thought this would be a good opportunity, one, uh to feel a little feminine, get to put on a gown once. And then two, uh more importantly, develop those skills of public speaking and learning how to effectively communicate my nonprofit. So I did a bunch of like random pageants over the years, and it wasn't until my senior year uh over Christmas break that I watched Miss America for the first time in ages. Like I don't really remember the last time that I watched it. And it was the year that the uh the woman that crowned me, Grace Stanke, won. And I remember watching her that night and all the other wonderful women on stage and getting to hear how driven, emotionally intelligent, uh, uh intelligent and in their school and their work and uh all of the passion and service that they did. And I saw that is something that I that I wanted to be a part of because I felt uh you're always trying to find kind of what group that you fit into, and I felt like the Miss America system best represented who I was, and I felt like that side of me was going to be valued that uh it's not just what happens on stage, but like most of it is what happens off stage and the work that you do, the career that you have, uh, the the work that you're willing to do in your community. So I decided to pull my name from the other pageants that I was gonna compete in that year, and just decided I'm just gonna go compete in Miss Colorado. Wow. And then ended up winning Miss Colorado a couple days before I graduated from the Air Force Academy. That's so exciting! So then I had that, and then I went and I competed at Miss America uh in between my fall and spring semester at Harvard.

unknown 32:25

Oh.

SPEAKER_00 32:25

And then obviously after I won, I couldn't come back.

SPEAKER_02 32:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 32:29

So I had to take a year of absence from Harvard to go do the tour for that. And then I just came back last January to finally finish. That's incredible.

SPEAKER_01 32:39

So I mean, just to backtrack a bit, so you won right or a couple days before you graduated, which is so exciting. Yeah. I can only imagine. There's a lot, there's a lot going on. There's like so much to so much to celebrate.

SPEAKER_00 32:51

And then and then you were Miss Colorado up until you So yeah, so everyone essentially you go and you compete for a state across the US, and then everyone comes together for like 10 days to do competition. So it's a very it's it's a long, it's a long time. Yeah. So I competed in January of 2024, and it was like you do 10 days, you do interview, you do multiple rounds of preliminary competitions where it's like the traditional traditional things like evening gown and fitness, but you also have public speaking, you have talent, you have a private interview, you have more on stage questions, uh and you compete in all of those over and over and over again. And then finals night, was it January 14th? I can't even remember the date. I think it was January 14th, maybe. Mid-January. That was that was the finals night of Miss America, and basically what happens then is after all this competition the whole week, yeah, they will call a top eleven. So that top eleven will go and you recompete in everything again. So you will recompete and on you do like an on-stage question, and that night they changed it, and it was a random political question. Oh my. So mine was just drugs in America. So I got to talk about cancer drug therapy in America and that development. Then you do evening gown fitness again, you do your talent again, then they take all of those, and then they select a top five out of those scores. Then you can recompete again, and you do another on stage question, and then they'll do all of like the crowning. If you've ever seen like the traditional videos where it's like fourth runner-up, third runner-up, second runner-up, and then you're holding hands with the final girl, and they call the name. So that's kind of how it all works. There's a lot of different competing and recompeting, but it's a lot of fun. A lot of rounds. A lot, a lot of rounds. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 34:38

And then I I remember when when you won, Madison, because that's what they sh the clip that they showed on TV where you were like holding. And you were in like complete shock, it seemed like that. Yes. Really? What was that feeling? What was that feeling like?

SPEAKER_00 34:55

I always describe to people, I had no thoughts in my head. I think for the first time ever, this is the quietest my brain has ever been because I had just I had never even expected to make the top 11. I mean, obviously, it's very competitive. Any woman that enters into Miss America and makes to that point could be a phenomenal Miss America, right? Yeah. So I went into the week just thinking, like, my goals for this week, I can't make them something that's going to be out of my control, like winning. You go through multiple different panels of judges, it can become very subjective, right? So I was like, all of that is out of my control. I can't make anyone like me or score me well. All I can do is come come prepared and come with a good mindset. So I made all of my other goals like make friends this week, be able to effectively talk about my mom and like things that were that I could show up and control. And my I think my other one was like, have fun. Just have fun this week. Uh so I remember the morning of finals, uh, I texted my now husband and said, make sure no one treats me like a wounded dog when I don't make top 11 because I don't care. I was I said, I like I don't care. I'm gonna be fine. I want everyone to just like everyone else needs to be okay with it because all I want to do is just have fun and enjoy, like, I wanted to watch the other girls compete and like have fun with my family that week, like that night once I was finally done, and just it can be a really stressful and exhausting week, but at the same time, it's a lot of fun. Like you're meeting all these incredible women who I'm still close friends with from all around the US, and I wanted to just be like, I don't want it to be a negative thing. Like, I got to come here and compete and be on the stage and I'll never do it again. So, like, don't worry about it, guys. I'm not like I'm gonna be okay. So then when I made top 11, I was just like, oh sweet, now my family that flew out for finals can actually watch me recompete. Yeah. So then I didn't expect to make top five, and then when I made top five, I was thinking, oh shoot, I didn't prepare for this final question because it wasn't even a thought in my head that I was gonna make top five. So then I was like, oh, I was really scared backstage, and then after I did the the top five question, my good friend Lila, who's my Miss Wisconsin, we had actually competed with each other in another pageant prior to this. So it was really cool getting to go to Miss America together. She came up to me, I don't remember what she said to me, like before, like this is like minutes before crowning. And I said, I was like, I'm so scared, I'm so scared right now because I had just not fully like processed or thought through what was going to happen. So then when they were calling the top five, I kept thinking, my name's gonna be next. Like, I'm waiting for them to call like Madison, this next one. And then I was like, oh no, because then it's me and Ellie Bro, my Miss Texas, also phenomenal young woman, yeah, standing there, and I was like, oh no. Okay, surely my surely my name is going to get called next. And then when they called it for Miss America, I remember whenever we were standing there, they wait such a long time with like the cameras circling around you. Like the suspense is I'm pretty sure we both said to each other, like, you're gonna be a great Miss America. Like we both said, we both said that to each other, and I just remember like no thoughts in my head at all. Just like silence and a little bit of fear because like it's it's so like all of the people in the audience, everyone watching online, that is a lot of eyes all at once, and then after I won, obviously I was was very shocked. Um, but it was really special, and then I got to be with my family afterwards. My uh husband, he actually proposed the week after I won Miss America and had been planning it for six months because you treated in the past you can't really be engaged prior to Miss America, or really while you were Miss America. I was the first publicly engaged Miss America. Oh it was just like an outdated rule. Okay. So he was like, I'm gonna propose to her after Miss America because then it's not gonna matter. And he was like, and apparently he was like, I'm gonna do it regardless if she wins or not. So I remember after I won, I was thinking in my head, well, now we can't get engaged for a year. And I started crying to him. And I was like, I'm so sad. Actually, before I walked up to him and I and I after I won at the end of the stage, and I was like, Are you okay if I accept, like, if if they bring me backstage and I have to sign a contract right now, are you good with this? Because I would never, we don't make decisions without each other. And he was like, Yes, please. So then once he's up on stage with me, I'm crying to him. I'm turning around and saying, No, we're not gonna get engaged. And he was like, Don't worry, I have a plan. And I was like, You don't understand. I, in my head, was thinking we were going to get engaged this summer. And he was like, Don't worry, it's all gonna work out. All of my family and friends that were there knew and already had flights to go out to Boston next week. He actually proposed here, so they already knew, and so I remember the whole next day after I won, he was sitting with me in my hotel room after we finished like all of the initial briefings. Obviously, I had to do a lot with the Air Force because the Air Force would hand me on active duty. So, like my first call was to attorneys at the Air Force, not to family. So I was with doing that the whole day with him, and I just remember sitting there and I was just crying to him because I was like, I had this whole plan, we were gonna get married next summer, and yada yada yada. Yeah. Ended up, my timeline ended up working out perfectly because then he just proposed the next week. Uh, but he had been planning that since he had the ring, I believe, in August. So, like months prior to this. He was, I don't know how my family kept their mouths closed for that long. No one blew the secret. Like, I I was shocked, but everyone pulled it off. So I got to be shocked twice in a week, and it was awesome.

SPEAKER_01 40:28

Wow. I'm seeing like these trends, Madison, of like when you first won Miss Colorado and graduation, like a lot happening or very exciting time there. And then when you won Miss America and getting engaged, like they become two for me.

unknown 40:41

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 40:43

Um I want to get into a little bit, Madison. I know you're you're wrapping up your time here, and so just curious to learn a little bit more about how you're thinking about the future. Where where do you see yourself next? What kind of problems do you do you hope to solve?

SPEAKER_00 40:59

So I'm gonna be back in normal Air Force, so not here as a student anymore. So I'll get to be serving as a public affairs officer in an official capacity, so super excited to get to have that role and communicate um with the rest of the United States in in that in that capacity in that job. And then beyond that, I'm really excited to continue. I actually run a private business for uh interview coaching for young women. Oh, no way. Yes, so I get to do all of that. I I've worked a lot with pageant contestants, but also a lot with people that are applying for these scholarships to help prepare them with those skills uh for whatever their next steps are gonna be in life. I believe that public speaking changed my life. It gave me the opportunity to do every scholarship that I've ever gotten to come to Harvard and all of the too many, too many interviews that we had to do at the academy to be allowed to come here. Of course, Miss America and being able to use that entire experience with public speaking. There are many opportunities in my life I wouldn't have had without that, and being able to pass down that skill and hopefully be a mentor to these young women and whatever next phase of life that they're in. So getting to grow that business in my free time, and then of course running the nonprofit and ensuring that we're continuing to grow that and for over the next couple of years, forming those partnerships with more hospitals around the United States to make sure that any person that gets diagnosed, they're not having to choose between getting the best care and financial stability. We always want people to say, like, this is the place that I want to get treated at, it's the best of the best, and then we will hopefully try to take away every barrier that it is going to take to get you to that place. So ensuring that our nonprofit is growing in the right direction, uh, gaining those partnerships, gaining those sponsorships so that we can actually fund those programs. So lots of different fun things. I get to move in with my husband in like two weeks. That's so exciting. That'll be those are all right. It's gonna be much hotter than it is out here.

SPEAKER_01 43:05

That is awesome. Um All right, Madison. Before we close out, I'd love to do a little rapid fire with with Rashana segment. Are you ready? Yes, that's okay.

SPEAKER_02 43:14

Hopefully.

SPEAKER_01 43:17

All right, Madison. You you mentioned that you got your your license, your your pilot license when you were in high school. Yes. And then we talked about pageantry. Which one gives you a bigger adrenaline rush? Flying a plane or walking down or competing on a pageant?

SPEAKER_00 43:33

Pageant, because flying I flew like a little Cessna, and flying that is kind of like driving a car. Oh. Yeah. But there are some parts of flying it that can be a little adrenaline rush. Like I think my first solo flight, I was 16 years old. That was really scary. Yeah. But I think Miss America, there's so many more people watching. So that was that was a big adrenaline rush.

SPEAKER_01 43:56

All right, all right. I love it. Um Do you have a a Pre big moment ritual, Madison. Before you go on stage or before I'm trying to think.

SPEAKER_00 44:09

It is this cheesy Katy Perry song that I will put on. Oh my gosh, I can't believe I'm blanking on it. There is a Katy Perry song that I listened to like full volume.

SPEAKER_01 44:22

It's not the plastic bag one. No.

SPEAKER_00 44:24

It's um Dark Horse? No. No, not Dark Horse. Um Katy Perry song. It is a it's a Katy Perry song that's oh my gosh. I I wish I could remember the name. It's literally like number one on like I have a pre-stage playlist, and that is one of the last songs that I will listen to before I go out. Yeah. And it's just like a cheesy, good, pop-up song, full volume. That's what I'm listening to. Love it. Love it. You can never go wrong with Katie Perry.

SPEAKER_01 44:54

Um class at Harvard that had the greatest impact on you.

SPEAKER_00 45:00

I know it might be hard to boil it down to one, but my uh healthcare regulatory industry class. It was with my professor, Lee Moore Daphne, who now is my was my advisor on my PAE. Uh that was the most eye-opening class ever. And I loved it. Oh, love it. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_01 45:19

Um I know you like to to read Madison and run. So which one do you prefer? Good run or good read? Good read. Good read. Okay. On the topic of books, um, I feel like learning about your story here in Madison, I feel like a book could be written about your about your journey and your story. So I'm curious to know if there was a title for it.

SPEAKER_00 45:39

Yes. So I am actually in the process of writing a book right now. So it'll be a long a while before that ever comes out. But I think the title of the book for me would be Later Is Too Late. Uh that is mostly because my uh that's the message that I got from my mom that later is too late to wait to do anything, to apologize, to change your life, to to take on that new job, to take an opportunity, because the only difference between us and someone like my mom is they know when they're gonna pass away. We don't. Uh and so being able to utilize that every day when we wake up, this is another day that someone like my mom or anyone else doesn't get to the opportunity to have. So use today to the best of your ability. Work out, call your family, tell people that you love them, apologize when you screw up. Uh go on and take those new opportunities, take that leap because later is too late, and you don't know when it's going to be too late to do those actions. Um, so that's kind of core message of what the book is going to be, and that's maybe what I would title it, depending on the publisher if they're if they're cool with that.

SPEAKER_01 46:48

I am so excited to know that there's a there's a book in the coming our way. Um you've you've had a lot of on-screen moments, Madison. Your proudest moment that no one saw. Oh gosh.

SPEAKER_00 47:04

Hmm. I think even though that there were obviously pictures of this, but I think my gr graduating from the Air Force Academy. I remember you throw up your hat, the thunderbirds fly over at the same time. We had uh President Biden was there that did our ceremony. There's a president every four years, and getting to have that moment was so surreal for me because I never thought that I would have actually made it that far. I remember my very first day of basic training, uh showing up, standing on the footsteps, getting yelled at once again. This is a common theme here, knowing that if I were to turn around, um, my mom wasn't gonna be there, and that I was starting this for the first time, I was starting a whole new life experience that my mom would have was never going to witness a single piece of it. And so when I finally made it to graduation, getting to know that even though she wasn't gonna be, I knew that if I turn around, she still wasn't gonna be there, that she got to have her heart and her legacy be a part of my entire experience there, and finally getting to to make the to reach this final massive milestone there, that I did make it, and on all of the days that I wanted to quit, that I wanted to give up, that somehow, some way I found good people to lean on that made sure that I didn't quit. Uh, and I got to be there for that last moment. And so when that when that hat went up in the air, those were the things that I was thinking of. And there's a a video of me just sobbing. Oh, and then my my now husband was the one that put on my rank for the first time as a lieutenant. So getting to have that moment with him, he was someone that helped me so much come out of that dark place while I was grieving to to live this life that I have today that it that is filled with joy, and getting to take that grief and turn it into something that can be good, and trying to find the good in any situation that I'm in, that's what that moment quietly was was representing to me.

unknown 49:01

Wow.

SPEAKER_01 49:01

That's so touching, Madison. Thank you for for sharing that. Um to to wrap up question, my my final question for you, Madison, is I know we started this conversation by asking, who is Madison Marsh? I'm curious to know, and I I want to end the conversation by saying, where are you going next? and and who do you hope to be?

SPEAKER_00 49:22

I think I've learned my lesson in life now to never to never set uh this rigid life path for myself, knowing that there's gonna be so much in life that's going to be changing all the time. I don't even know where I'm gonna be living in a year from now. Uh I don't know when my husband and I are gonna be able to start a family. So there's so much that's going to be evolving and changing, but I think at the root of it all, who I want to be is someone that doesn't just see success as something that we complete based off of a one-off goal. Because if we try to just have our internal success be something visible and big, we might be chasing our entire life some invisible finish line and never really feeling like our life is filled with meaning. And that can make in those moments where we achieve these big pieces, end up feeling meaningless because along the way, we have not lived our life rooted in our values. So no matter where I go, what I do, I hope the person that I can be every day and who I become is I never take on a job or a position that's not rooted in my values, and that I can view my success as more than something that goes on a resume, but instead in the small actions that I take every day, our life becomes our small choices. Our life is not those big pieces that are on our resume. It is literally the small choices that we decide to make every single day, and understanding the weight of those, understanding that I need to be setting my big goals as a part of an alignment with the values that I have, and how do I live out those values every day in life? That's how I've defined success. That's who the person that I want to be, how I want to continue to become and live a life rooted in that authenticity and aligning with what I'm gonna want when it comes time for the end of my life, that I can look back and say that I lived truly according to my values, and that is what made my life filled with meaning.

SPEAKER_01 51:20

What a powerful note to end this conversation on. Madison, you are so magnificent. Thank you. Thank you so much for for coming on Beyond Harvard. Thank you so much for having me.

SPEAKER_00 51:31

It's been so much fun here today.

SPEAKER_01 51:32

It's such a pleasure.