Twenty-two De Soto High School students participated in the annual Natalie M. Fashion Show at the Overland Park Convention Center on Feb. 3.

The fashion show is made up of students from many different schools, all hoping to fundraise for a certain event. For DHS, the funds raised from the fashion show are going toward the prom budget, which will be used by the Prom Committee to fund the dance. This event is the main fundraiser for prom, and is what determines the decoration budget, as well as the price of prom tickets.  

“The Natalie M. Fashion Show has been something we’ve [DHS] been a part of for the past four years, and they’ve [Natalie M.] been doing it way longer than that,” Prom Committee sponsor Caroline Friday explained. “The great part about it is that they give 100 percent of the funds raised back to the schools to use for whatever they choose, which for us is prom, and that’s perfect since the show is all about modeling prom dresses.”

Junior class president Corinne Daise, who is partly in charge of planning for prom, participated the recent fashion show, taking a leadership role to get many students involved.

“My main role [as junior class president] was to get people involved and aware of the fashion show so more people join and we can raise more money,” Daise explained. “All of the money we raise goes toward prom, and it’s our biggest fundraiser for it.”

Prior to the show, all participants were required to attend a modeling seminar that taught inexperienced members how to properly walk and present themselves on the runway. Hoffman Models International, a local modeling agency which was a sponsor for this event, and led the seminar so that students felt fully prepared for the actual show.

All student models got the chance to walk down the runway twice to show off the dress that they were given. Overall, participants found this experience to be a very fun opportunity.

“It was completely different from anything I’d ever done before so it was a really cool experience, and it was also fun to meet a lot of different people from different schools and backgrounds. Overall, it was a lot of fun to participate in,” Daise said.

Overall,  students were able to raise approximately $2,200 to go toward this year’s prom budget. These funds are essential in organizing prom, according to Friday.

“We really want as many people as possible to participate in the show, because the more money we raise for this then the more money we have to make our prom as fun as possible. This is our main fundraiser and is really important to our prom budget,” Friday said.