Kira Kazantsev (born July 20, 1991) is an American beauty pageant titleholder who won Miss America 2015 on September 14, 2014. She is the third consecutive Miss America winner from New York and had won the title of Miss New York on May 24, 2014 while serving as Miss City of New York.
Kazantsev was born on July 20, 1991 in San Francisco, California, to Russian immigrants who left Moscow in 1990 for the United States, making her a first-generation American. Her father, George, is a general surgeon and her mother, Julia (née Afrikian), is a real-estate broker. She has one brother named Boris, who is three years younger. Kazantsev is trilingual, being fluent in English, Russian, and Spanish.
She graduated from Las Lomas High School in Walnut Creek, California and served as the student body president in 2009. She attended Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York with a triple major in political science, global studies, and geography. During junior year at Hofstra University, she studied abroad in Barcelona, Spain. After graduating from Hofstra, Kazantsev applied to numerous law schools and was accepted to Notre Dame Law School and Fordham Law School. She stated in interviews, after being named Miss America 2015, her desire to specialize in international law upon receiving her law degree.