The Debutante Ball for All: A Case Study
The Debutante Ball for All: A Night to Remember
For many teenagers and young adults in the Seymour area, the 11th of November 2006 was probably just
another Saturday night. But for 18 young men and women, along with around 300 of their friends and family
members, it was a night to remember: their chance to take part in a social coming-of-age often unavailable to
people with disabilities or those experiencing social or economic disadvantage. The Debutante Ball for All was
an initiative of RuralAccess at Mitchell Community Health Services and Seymour Neighbourhood Renewal, with
help from Seymour Special School as well as local businesses, services and community volunteers. The
resounding success of the first event has led to plans to hold the event biennially in the future.
The idea for the Debutante Ball for All arose after RuralAccess worker Naomi Zandt and Simon Hill from
Seymour Neighbourhood Renewal saw the need for more inclusive activities for young people with disabilities or
from socially disadvantaged backgrounds. Young people had been telling them they wanted to take part in a
deb ball, but for reasons including access issues or financial barriers, couldn’t take part in those already held in
the area. A working group was formed, with members from RuralAccess/Mitchell Community Health Services,
Neighbourhood Renewal, the local parents’ support group, volunteers, and young adults wishing to take part in
the ball.
Naomi Zandt explains how the Debutante Ball for All got off the ground and quickly became a much larger
project than was first expected, involving a broad section of the community:
‘Many community volunteers, agencies and business got involved by doing particular tasks for the event. A local
TAFE student, Priscilla Matters, assisted in planning the event with a particular focus on fundraising. Local
businesses were important contributors, providing financial support and services that minimised event costs.
One of the participants’ family members did the lighting and venue set-up. Local residents did DJ-ing, organised
free loan of glasses, and the debutantes themselves decorated the venue.’
Department of Human Services
Planning for the Debutante Ball for All involved not only securing a venue, decorating it and organising the
night’s activities, music, and presentation of the debutantes. It also meant arranging accessible dance classes
over ten weeks before the event, and providing suit hire, hairdressing and makeup for participants at no cost.
Ainslie Leggo, Activities Officer at Seymour Neighbourhood Renewal, says that putting together the Debutante
Ball for All was challenging, both for the committee organising the many tasks that needed to be done, and for
the participants as well. For many of these young people, taking part represented a significant step outside their
comfort zone. But with hard work and a lot of mutual trust, the event began to take shape, beginning with the
dance classes:
‘Trish and Ken Boulton, who taught the participants, were great.
They took each week as it came, each young adult as they came –
this in itself was amazing to watch. Each young adult came with
their own needs, and watching them grow over the ten weeks
made me cry on the night: the participants and their individual skills
and personalities were what made the night.’
‘The event brought together
community groups, residents and
agencies to work together on a
common goal…It also provided a
celebration of local young people
from diverse backgrounds, who came
together and made connections and
friendships that they may not have
otherwise.’
Davis Stokes was one of the participants who took part in the
Debutante Ball for All, held at the specially decorated Seymour
Technical High School Hall. Around a dozen of his family and friends were there to see him presented to
Member for Seymour, Ben Hardman, and his wife Gail. Davis remembers ‘feeling special and having fun’, as
well as recalling the more formal side of the event:
‘I thought it was good dressing up in a suit and having everyone there. It was a hot night though, and in the suits
and everything it just got a bit hot, there was no air conditioning! We weren’t meant to take our jackets off, but
we took them off at the end of our official dancing, and also to eat our dinner.’
Davis says of the dance classes, ‘at first it was hard, but then we got to know the dances,’ adding that as a
result of taking part in the Debutante Ball for All he feels ‘more confident of doing things in front of other people’.
The Debutante Ball for All has very successfully met a need expressed by some of the Seymour area’s more
isolated young residents, and has also become a significant local event encouraging community connection,
involvement and cooperation. As Naomi Zandt says:
‘The event brought together community groups, residents and agencies to work together on a common goal.
People were able to get involved and help out in any way they could and provided the local community with a
celebration of its connection and its ability to achieve by working together. It also provided a celebration of local
young people from diverse backgrounds, who came together and made connections and friendships that they
may not have otherwise. These young people were able to create a place where they could do their deb just as
well as anyone else, but in a secure environment in which they felt safe to be themselves.’
More information
RuralAccess Project Officer, Mitchell Community Health Service
Ph: (03) 5784 5555
TTY: (03) 5784 5525