Miss America visits elementary school in Colorado Springs, reflects on historic pageant win

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (KRDO) - Madison Marsh, the newly crowned pageant queen of the United States, returned to Colorado for the first time since her big win, and stopped by a local elementary school to speak with students.

The Air Force graduate had made multiple visits to Jackson Elementary in the past while she was a cadet at the Academy, reading and talking to the young students.

Now, as Miss Colorado, turned Miss America, she wants to use her platform not just for her own ambitions but to inspire more young people to pursue higher education, and their goals in life.

"I hope a lot of these younger kids, men and women, have someone that they can look up to that with anything, you can overcome all those barriers." explained Marsh.

She hopes those kids can take on the lesson of chasing what they're passionate about, a lesson that was driven home for Marsh after the passing of her mother just a few years ago.

"She would give anything to have one extra day, one extra moment. And so for me, it is important to not waste any time, every moment that you waste on a passion that you don't care about as a moment that is wasted in your life." said Marsh about her late mother.

Marsh, the first active military officer to win Miss America in the pageant's 103 year history, is still trying to soak in her new crowning new achievement.

"I had like 30 people that are like all my closest friends and family that were able to fly in. I just remember walking off the stage and being able to like, hug my dad, my aunt, my *now* fiancé, and it was just everyone getting to be there with me was so, so surreal." said Marsh.

However for Marsh, life resumes. She say's she wants to stay true to herself and not let the national title change her, by staying focused on her non-profit which she created in her mother's name.

"I've been kind of diving into pancreatic cancer, because it is one of the most underfunded cancers in the us, but yet it's the number three cancer killer." explained Marsh, who says her mother was misdiagnosed for the cancer that turned deadly.

Miss America will not only be pursuing a graduate degree at Harvard, thanks to additional scholarship opportunities from winning the pageant, but also aims to get back into the skies to serve her country in the United States Air Force.