Running for Homecoming Royalty is a trial in itself. First and foremost, you have to be active on your campus. Join an organization and do work! Make a difference. Be there for your organization and maybe, MAYBE, after years of hard work and dedication, they will elect you to represent the organization as a whole in the grand process that is Homecoming. After you are selected by your organization, you have to fill out an extensive application for the Homecoming Committee just for a chance to again be selected for Homecoming Court. After you spend a week on your application, it is reviewed, scored and averaged against all of the applicants from the other organizations on campus. Then you have the painstakingly long wait just to find out whether you made top 5 boys or top 5 girls or not. And trust me, the wait is no fun, but it is an unbelievable feeling of satisfaction when you receive a congratulations email.

It is a great honor to be selected for Homecoming Court. You have to dress up a bit to get your picture taken for a press release at a meeting where you have to talk about all of the rules to campaigning and the schedule for all of the required events. Its a lot to take in, especially on the SAME day you received your congratulations email.

And at the very end of the meeting, they give you your randomly assigned running partner with whom you'll campaign with, ride in the parade with and walk on to the football field with.

To go through all of that with another person as deserving as you to be on Homecoming Court is a very exciting thought!

What's even better is being partnered up with one of your best friends.

I am unbelievably blessed to have a partner who is as amazing as Haydee Reyes is.

I have had the pleasure of being her Peer Academic Leader for her Living and Learning Community her first year of school at Fort Hays State University and I've seen first hand how much she has worked and how much she has grown over the years. She has put in a ton of work into the very organization that nominated her for Homecoming, Stripes for Hope. After two years of hard work and dedication to this organization that raises money for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital all year round, she has taken the reins to lead the organization to even more success. It brings me so much joy just to think about how far she has come and how deserving she is to be on the Homecoming Court. Even more so, I've had the great pleasure of working with her in several capacities. One of those being my favorite job my entire college career, Orientation, and her being one of the reasons it has been my favorite job. To work as an Orientation Leader on the FHSU campus means having a sense of pride and adoration for your school and I believe with all of my heart that Haydee Reyes embodies those very principles.

Forget about everything that Haydee Reyes has done. I'm thinking about the person she is today. She is extremely temperate and loving and pious and a beautiful person. She is a woman who will laugh at you just as much as she laughs with you. She'll put up with your late night campaign meeting and all of your group texts reminders of upcoming meetings for your campaign. She'll take cute pictures with you for your campaign. She'll even ask her international residents to chalk with you because you want to reach out to more people!

Admittedly, I have been a little crazy about our campaign, but only because I've been having so much with it! Also, I knew she would put up with me just like she has the past two years.

To Haydee Reyes:

Thank you so much for your unconditional love and support. I love you to the moon and back. There isn't anybody else I would want riding with me in the parade or walking onto Lewis Field with.

To the rest of Fort Hays state University:

Haydee Reyes deserves to be your 2016 Homecoming Queen. Plain and simple.

#VoteHaydeeOurLady