MIAMI – Like many people who grow up in the Lake Region, it’s easy to feel as though life is split between two, if not three, counties – Alachua, Bradford and Clay.

And even though that’s somewhat the case for the new Miss Florida, Courtney Sexton, she is thankful for the hometown support she received from everyone, everywhere.

“I am thankful for the outpouring of support and encouragement. I really felt I had my community behind me as a strong support system. I felt all of the love I received. I’m just so happy to be able to bring the crown of Miss Florida home to such a great area,” Sexton said in a phone interview from the offices of The Miss Florida Scholarship Pageant Inc.

While growing up in Clay County’s Kingsley Lake, Sexton grew up attending Bradford County public schools. Her mother, Sherry Sexton, teaches kindergarten at Clay County’s Shadowlawn Elementary.

“We went to Publix in Middleburg to get our groceries,” Courtney Sexton said. “I can say I honestly grew up in both [Clay and Bradford]. I did spend a lot of time in Starke.”

Sexton, 23, won an $18,000 scholarship, which will help her complete a master of health administration at the University of Central Florida, however, right now, her full-time job is Miss Florida. She will complete her master’s in 2018.

“I still have a year-and-a-half to go,” she said.

Sexton admits she has “to pinch myself all the time” to realize she is actually not in a dream and that she actually was crowned Miss Florida on July 2 at the Youkey Theatre at the Lakeland Center. Having won the Miss Florida Outstanding Teen as a 15-year-old, Sexton was crowned Miss Orlando while also at UCF and went on to compete to represent the Sunshine State on Sept. 6 in the Miss America pageant. She won the “lifestyle, fitness and swimsuit” preliminary competition earlier that week, her talent is dance, but her passion lies with her platform – getting Floridians to volunteer.

“Only 18 percent of my generation is volunteering and that’s an outrageously low number. I see a real need for volunteerism in our state,” Sexton said.

Next year, Sexton will embark on a statewide tour where she will promote literacy in tandem with encouraging others to get out and connect with a nonprofit cause.

“My platform is all about connecting people with organizations and causes that they care about and that they want to volunteer with,” Sexton said. “It’s about starting the volunteer bug around our state and our nation.”

One of Sexton’s favorite places at which to volunteer her time are children’s hospitals, particularly those connected to the Children’s Miracle Network. She enjoys brightening the days of children who are undergoing everything from cancer to surgery recovery who may simply need a visit from someone they never could imagine having met.

“When I’m at a hospital talking with a child, I just try to be as real and me as possible. I just have a conversation with them that they don’t normally get to have. I just get to know them and make that moment special. It’s not every day that Miss Florida will walk into a hospital room, so I just try to make it a memorable experience, an experience they will never forget.”

When asked about whether some of the age-old stereotypes about pageants are still valid today, Sexton said Miss America and its state-level organizations are first and foremost about service.

“I think that service is the backbone of giving. Miss America is someone who is more than a title and more than a crown. She is a woman who can go to Capitol Hill in the morning and then later in the day sit on the floor and color and bond with children and because of that, we’ve definitely broken all stereotypes because of what we stand for,” Sexton said.

Fresh off a visit to Washington, D.C. and a Miss America Organization orientation session where she met 51 other contestants who will compete for the crown, Sexton said she is easing into her new role. However, the coming weeks will be filled preparing to be thrust in the national spotlight in Atlantic City on Sept. 6.

She views the women she met as her new family of sisters.

“We’re embarking on this journey together. We’ve all worked so hard to get where we are, and although it’s a competition, we are working together. We’ve all put so much into this and we’re supporting each other through this journey and that’s what sisters do – sisters support each other,” Sexton said.

“We really want to make a difference.”