22nd annual Theresa A. Mike Scholarship Foundation Fashion Show

22nd annual Theresa A. Mike Scholarship Foundation Fashion Show

By Emily Clarke

The lights are low and golden. A red carpet leads well-dressed guests from the professional photo booth to the doors of the Spotlight 29 Casino showroom. It is obvious the guests are excited, and who wouldn’t be? This is the 22nd annual Theresa A. Mike Scholarship Foundation Fashion Show, sale, and dinner. It’s going to be a magical night for a good cause. As a line forms in front of the registration table, Native teens dressed as Disney princesses float gracefully around the room handing out tubs of cotton candy and paper bags of warm popcorn.

The Theresa A. Mike Scholarship Foundation was established in 1997 to honor Theresa herself, who passed away, full of big dreams, as a new mother when she was only twenty-three. Theresa studied business and worked in human resources while also pursuing positions of tribal leadership. The scholarship awards are open for application to “any full-time post secondary or graduate student with a cumulative GPA of 3.0 or higher,” but the applicant must also fit one of three other requirements. Applicants must be an enrolled member of a federally recognized tribe, a resident of the Coachella valley, or an employee of the 29 Palms Band of Mission Indians. The scholarship foundation often holds fundraisers like the 22nd annual fashion show, sale, and dinner in order to raise funds to support as many hardworking students as possible.

The theme of the night is “Once Upon a Dream,” and when the showroom doors are finally opened, guests are delighted by the copious amounts of glittering decor that covers every dinner table. Towards the back of the showroom are long tables filled with silent-auction and raffle items. The luminous runway fills the front of the showroom along with large projection screens that animated Disney characters use to relay fun messages to guests. Atop each dinner table is the first of three courses: a rose made from carefully sliced cucumbers and filled with a summer salad. Each guest also receives a goody bag filled with detailed scholarship information, fashion coupons, and various other small items. In the center of every table is a handmade centerpiece. Some tables are equipped with miniature versions of Cinderella’s carriage or the rose from Beauty and the Beast.

Once the hundreds of guests have been seated and are happily beginning their gourmet dinners, the event officially begins with a lively, Disney-themed performance by Shalini Varghese, a local vocal artist, and the CVHS Dance Team. Then, guests receive a few key announcements from Brooke Beare, a local newscaster, and Michael Frawley from the Spotlight 29 Casino.

At last, the show begins. Families, couples, teens, and children, many of them Native, prance down the runway to the beat of energetic music. They are modeling spring fashions from JCPenney. Some models are as young as five or six, and the audience giggles and applauds when they wave and smile as they totter to the edge of the runway. As the models show off their trendy outfits, guests are served dinner. Some stay seated at their tables to eat and enjoy the show while others browse the silent auction or buy raffle tickets. All proceeds of the many sales, auctions, and raffles serve as donations to the Theresa A. Mike scholarship foundation, as do the event ticket sales.

After the first half of the fashion show, guests are treated to more performances by Shalini Varghese and the CVHS Dance Team, as well as an emotional, up-lifting speech by Ricardo Ramierez, Theresa A. Mike Scholarship recipient. As Ricardo chuckles, telling the tables full of smiling guests how much the scholarship has truly made a huge impact on his educational journey, an intense emotion seems to take over the entire room. This is the moment guests realize how important tonight really is. The Theresa A. Mike Scholarship Foundation, which began due to a heartbreaking tragedy, really does change lives.

As dainty plates of gourmet dessert are served by the cheerful Spotlight 29 Casino staff, poised female models sashay down the runway in evening wear from Grayse, a nearby, up-scale shop selling clothing designed by Kelly and Marie Gray. Many audience members gasp and coo, nudging the guest next to them with their elbow to point out the sophisticated formal wear. The models hair and makeup is done beautifully, yet simply by volunteers from Mai Salon and Sephora. You can see the confidence radiate off the models, and it is hard to know who is having more fun: the audience or the models themselves.

After the finale of Grayse fashions, the event comes to a close with an inspiring address by Robert Paul from the Theresa A. Mike Scholarship Foundation. He tells guests that the foundation awards around $90,000 in scholarships to 75 deserving, hard-working students a year. The Theresa A. Mike Scholarship Foundation has awarded a total of 800 scholarships since the foundation made its debut only twenty-one years ago. Robert smiles proudly at the audience as he says his thank yous and goodbyes, and then there is a final performance by Shalini Varghese and the CVHS Dance Team as guests, smiling, laughing, and embracing, slowly make their way out of the whimsical showroom and into the warm desert night.