Much more than a beauty queen
Stephanie Siriwardhana, BA11, never imagined she could become Miss Sri Lanka, much less a contestant for Miss Universe. Like many, she considered beauty pageants to be a vain pursuit, all smiles and waves. Yet when she was crowned Miss Sri Lanka in 2011, she didn’t expect it would give her the opportunity to help others in an incredibly meaningful way.
Born to a Sri Lankan father and Lebanese mother in Kuwait in 1988, Siriwardhana and her family moved to Sri Lanka when she was three years old, due to the 1991 Gulf War.
In the early 2000s they moved to Montreal, where Siriwardhana enrolled at Concordia and got involved in many aspects of student life. While completing her undergraduate degree in journalism, communication studies and political science, Siriwardhana got involved in student politics. She became vice president of the Concordia Student Union as well as an undergraduate student representative on Concordia’s Board of Governors and Senate.
She was also appointed as communications director of Youth Action Montreal, where she helped organize Living Your Legacy: A Youth Summit on Community Engagement in 2011. The event that featured prominent speakers including David Suzuki and Free the Children youth advocate Craig Kielburger.
Perhaps no one more profoundly influenced Siriwardhana than Kielburger, she says. After hearing his talk, she decided to become involved in a similar pursuit. Upon graduating, she returned to her family in Sri Lanka with the idea of founding a youth organization.
However, her mother had other plans.
“One day I came home and my mom said, ‘Guess what I did?’ It turns out she had entered me into the Miss Sri Lanka pageant,” says Siriwardhana.
“Having the background that I had from Concordia, I thought, ‘I’m an academic and not some shallow person that will just wave and look pretty.’”
Yet when she found out that she had been selected as one of the top 100 contestants, and with a bit of coaxing from her mother, Siriwardhana decided she might as well give it a try.
“I was a bit of a tomboy so I thought it was a good time to get in touch with my femininity and give it a shot.”
And she’s glad she did. The experience provided her with a golden opportunity to follow her dreams and help others.
Stephanie Siriwardhana, left, created a foundation to inspire youth to become socially responsible. The foundation is also developing a transitional shelter for sexually abused girls.
Stephanie Siriwardhana was named Miss Sri Lanka in 2011
“Now that I suddenly had a crown on my head, people actually wanted to hear what I was saying,” Siriwardhana says. “It was a great platform for me to vocalize all of the things that I wanted to.”
During her year as Miss Sri Lanka, she founded the Stephanie Siriwardhana Foundation, whose goal is to inspire, educate and empower individuals to become socially responsible and foster positive change both locally and globally.
“Now we are working on having a transitional shelter for sexually abused young girls, where they’ll get psycho-social counselling, vocational training and learn to reintegrate into society and be self-sustaining empowered young women,” she says.
“We’re also initiating a drug prevention program where we’re hoping to go into schools and use not just lectures, but workshops, plays and interactive role-playing to get the message across.”
In addition to running her foundation, Siriwardhana is also the curator of the Global Shaper World Economic Forum.
“My life has panned out in a way that I had never imagined. It’s honestly a fabulous journey to know that you can actually make a difference,” she says. “With this crown — this platform — that I have, I can push the fast-forward button when it comes to bringing awareness to a cause. You don’t need to win a pageant to do that. Sometimes you just need to follow where life takes you.”
Related links
- Learn about our university’s notable leaders, prominent researchers, entrepreneurs, artists, athletes and thinkers at concordia.ca/greatconcordians.
- Discover what Concordia achieved first in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and the world at concordia.ca/concordiafirsts.