Nicole Johnson-Baker

Upon being diagnosed with diabetes in 1993, Nicole Johnson-Baker vowed that she would never let the disease keep her from achieving a goal, whether it was earning an advanced degree or winning a beauty pageant.

She’s made good on her vow: In 1999, Johnson-Baker became the first diabetic to win the Miss America title—despite being warned that the competition’s physical demands put the crown out of her reach—and today she is enrolled in Pitt’s Graduate School of Public Health.

Not that reaching her goals has been easy.

“There were more years when I lost [pageant competitions] than won,” she remembers. “In those moments, I learned who I was. I became confident in myself, regardless of what other people thought.”

Pageants have opened doors for Johnson-Baker academically and professionally; for example, her Miss America scholarship money is helping fund her studies in GSPH, where she is working toward an M.S. in behavioral and community health science. Pageants offer a lot more than just opportunities to wear jeweled tiaras, she emphasizes. (In fact, Johnson-Baker says she wore the Miss America crown itself only once—on the day she won the title.) “A lot of people underestimate what Miss America is,” she says. “I chose to look at it as a way for women under the age of 24 to gain the national spotlight.”

A Florida native, Johnson-Baker moved to Pittsburgh a year-and-a-half ago to marry WTAE-TV news anchor Scott Baker and become a stepmother to his three children. “I really didn’t know what to expect,” she says of relocating to Pittsburgh. “I have been pleasantly surprised by the culture and the variety of opportunities available,” including enrolling in GSPH.

Johnson-Baker travels 100 days a year promoting diabetes education. She also has cochaired American Diabetes Association Walks with her husband and is a government affairs consultant for the American Diabetes Association (ADA); in Pittsburgh, she serves on the ADA Leadership Council. In addition, Johnson-Baker does volunteer work for the Allegheny Center Alliance Church on the North Side, the UPMC Diabetes Institute, and The Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

She also writes a column in the national magazine Diabetes Health and cohosts a new, weekly, 30-minute talk show on CNBC-TV called dlifeTV, devoted to diabetes-related topics. The show airs on Sundays at 7 p.m.

Johnson-Baker acknowledges that winning the Miss America crown has helped to accelerate her career—but she’s confident that she would have reached her goals in any case.

“I laid the groundwork for all the things I am doing now before becoming Miss America,” she says.