REXBURG—Young dancers from Rexburg’s Idaho Ballroom Academy have worked for weeks to prepare for this weekend’s Dancing with the Rexburg Stars.
Carolyn Broadbent, the chairperson for the planning committee, and a board member for the Madison Education Foundation, says the proceeds from the night have a special purpose.
“All of this goes towards our students and our teachers here in Madison County that work so tremendously hard and are just in need of those funds to be able to provide better experiences for their students in the classroom," Broadbent said.
The night is similar to the popular ABC TV show, with the “stars” and “pro dancers” training together and performing their numbers.
“They each perform one number," Broadbent said. "It's 90 seconds in length and then their score is based half on judges votes and half on audience votes.”
Unlike the show, a winner is announced the night of, and the community member “star” who wins gets a trophy to keep in their place of business for the next year.
“That trophy then gets passed on to the next winner and the previous year's winner becomes a judge as part of the judging panel,” Broadbent said.
Last year’s winner was Pete Noel, a D.A.R.E. resource officer for Madison Middle School.
All the stars are community members, who are nominated and agree to participate as volunteers.
“ We have business owners, the fire chief is dancing this year, usually we have somebody from campus and all of that,” Broadbent said. “So we try to find people from the community to bring in a good event and then we match them with a high school senior who is on the Idaho Ballroom Academy team.”
Broadbent jokingly said that in the 15 years she has been involved; community members have learned not to answer her calls if they don’t want to be asked to join the event.
Ultimately, she says the night is worth it to all who are involved, and those who go watch can expect high energy and happy faces.
“The stars get to pick the dances they want to do, so they're usually fun and upbeat. I know this year we have a lot of upbeat music that'll be played.”
Dancing with the Rexburg Stars is this Saturday at 7 p.m. at Madison High School’s main gym. To learn more, you can visit their Instagram page @dwtsrexburg.