Tessa Tricarico (24) wore a floor-length blue gown that sparkled in the spotlight, her blonde hair set in wavy cascades. With a sash draped across her chest and a silver tiara on her head, she walked across the stage as the National America Miss California of 2026. It was a moment she’ll never forget, but one she never thought she’d experience.
Growing up in a lower-income family, Tricarico saw how finances sometimes held her family back from pursuing the life they wanted to live. But she was determined to find a way to make her dream of attending Point Loma Nazarene University become a reality.
Tricarico began entering scholarship pageants, winning the title of Miss Teen Poway at the age of 16. With the help of the money she earned through that competition, Tricarico began her journey with PLNU in their dietetics program. But life didn’t go the way she initially planned.
The year was 2020, and the COVID-19 pandemic meant that classes had to transition to an online setting. While Tricarico was excited to start her college journey, she was disappointed by the way things were playing out.
“Nobody knew how to live online at that time, so it was just not what I expected,” Tricarico explained. “I wasn’t learning like I knew I could.”
Realizing that online learning wasn’t for her, Tricarico decided to drop out.
“I was a really good student in high school — I graduated with a 4.2 GPA,” she said. “So for me to be at the point where I needed to drop out because I felt like I couldn’t handle it was really shocking.”
Tricarico said she felt lucky to have the opportunity to drop out, since many kids in middle and high school didn’t have that option. That got her thinking: thousands of students were probably struggling with school, just like she was. She couldn’t stand idly by — she decided to do something about it.
After gathering a team of employees from her local high school district, Tricarico started her own tutoring LLC to help students thrive during the pandemic. Tricarico fell in love with her business, so much so that she decided to go back to PLNU — this time in-person — to learn more about entrepreneurship.
From marketing to business classes, Tricarico learned all the ins and outs of how to thrive both as an employer and employee. But the class that stood out to her the most wasn’t a business class at all — it was a creative writing class with Robbie Maakestad.
“I loved the freedom I got in his class to create. The personal branding that I learned how to do in his creative writing class took me so much further than any marketing class I was ever in.”
“I loved the freedom I got in his class to create,” Tricarico said. “The personal branding that I learned how to do in his creative writing class took me so much further than any marketing class I was ever in. [Now] almost every reel that I post on Instagram is a mini essay in my head.”
Learning how to brand herself was important to Tricarico, because it’s a crucial part of pageantry; a passion she continues to pursue today.
Once she aged out of local pageants, Tricarico began competing in National America Miss contests. Winning local pageants was how she could afford an education at PLNU, and these state competitions are how she continues to inspire both herself and others. She called her pageant platform “Career Confidence Through Authenticity,” teaching women how to define their own success and follow their dreams, just like she did.
Despite her confidence on stage, she wasn’t sure she would ever win a title as big as National America Miss.
“I actually bought myself a participation sash that said ‘National America Miss Competitor’ because I didn’t think I’d ever earn a sash of my own,” Tricarico said. “The level of competition was so much higher at state. The system that I compete in goes from age 4 to 39. I was going in at 21, competing against girls who’ve been in the system since they were 4 years old. I thought it was too late.”
Although it took a few years of settling for second place, Tricarico’s time in the spotlight finally came. After graduating from PLNU with a degree in business administration, she was crowned Miss California, believing that her college experience is what led her to win.
“When I won Miss California, I emailed each of [my professors] individually,” Tricarico said. “I picked out a specific moment in each class that helped me become Miss California, and I thanked them for it.”
One moment she recalled was when she gave a presentation in Randal Schober’s international business class.
“He came up to me after the presentation, and he told me that I was a phenomenal public speaker and that he’s never given a 100% on that assignment before, and I was going to be the first student to ever receive a 100% on the presentation,” Tricarico said. “That meant so much to me. Right before I went out to do my personal introduction [at the pageant] this year, I played that memory in my head, and I thought, ‘You’re such a good public speaker, Tessa.’”
For Tricarico, attending college and winning Miss California meant defying the odds. She said that she credits God’s timing for her win at the pageant, and hopes to win the national crown.
“If this is my year, I know that God will give it to me,” Tricarico said.
Today, Tricarico works as a healthcare recruiter for Ro Health, an organization based in San Diego. Although she’s since stepped away from her LLC, her goals remain the same: she wants to see herself and those around her thrive. For Tricarico, nothing is impossible.
