Beauty Pageants: Should You Enter Your Child In One? Are you the parent of a toddler or an elementary school aged child? If you are, have you ever thought about entering your child in a beauty pageant? If you are like many other parents, there is a good chance that the thought has at least crossed your mind before, but it is a good idea? When it comes to deciding whether or not you should enter your child in a beauty pageant there are a number of important factors that you should take into consideration. One of those factors is your location. Where do you live? If you do not live near a big city or a popular one, like Hollywood or New York City, there is a good chance that you would have a hard time finding pageants to enter your child into. Yes, you may be able to find a number of local beauty pageants, but if you are really serious about getting your child into modeling, you may find yourself having to travel long distances and spending quite a bit of money on that traveling. In addition to costs associated with travel, it is important that you examine the other costs associated with regularly entering your child into beauty pageants. With beauty pageants, your child is often required to wear different items of clothing, as well as perform in a talent show. Many parents spend thousand of dollars or more each year buying clothing for their children to wear or on courses for learning a new talent, like dancing or singing. Do you have that much money to spend? If you don’t, you can still proceed with entering your child into beauty pageants, but you may find it difficult to compete with other families who do have more money to spend. The work that goes into regularly participating in beauty pageants is something else that should be examined. You should look at the work and the sacrifices that are often made from two different angles. As a parent of a beauty pageant child, you may find yourself traveling a lot, spending a lot of time away from your home and other family members. You may also experience financial hardships, as that is something that many families report. As for your child, toddlers and elementary school age children often love spending time with their friends and just being a kid. If you take beauty pageants seriously, they may not have time to do everything that they know and love. Of course though, your child may prefer participating in beauty pageants. Speaking of your child, it is important that you include them in on the decision to participate in beauty pageants. Unfortunately, too many parents make the mistake of believing that their kids are too young to make the decision on their own. Yes, a toddler may be, but it is still advised that you discuss entering beauty pageant with them. What you may want to think about doing is entering them into one or two beauty pageants and then wait to see how it goes. You never know, but your child may deicide that he or she does like participating in them after all. The above mentioned factors are just a few of the many that you may want to take into consideration before automatically deciding that your child should regularly enter beauty pageants. As a reminder, it is a decision that shouldn’t be made by just one parent, but the whole family. PPPPP Word Count 576