Donated dresses help some shine at prom
The first dress Gilmara Alves tried on didn't fit right.
The second wasn't her style.
But the third made the 19-year-old senior giddy, as she stepped out of a makeshift changing room at Jeremiah E. Burke High School in Dorchester's Grove Hall, smiling, curtseying, and swaying in an ivory floor-length gown.
Prom night is tonight, and about 10 students had the opportunity to bring home the dress of their choice for free on Monday, courtesy of a drive organized by Boston police Sergeant Lisa Holmes, supervisor of the Grove Hall Safe Street Team, and Kendall Bruce, a street worker for the Boston Center for Youth and Families assigned to the area.
"At first I was nervous because I thought I wouldn't find the right one that I wanted, but I love the color and the style of this one," Alves said of the V-neck, spaghetti-strapped dress she selected.
Holmes said the souring economy sparked the idea to donate prom dresses to underprivileged high school girls, adding that she had realized how many of her friends owned gowns they wore only once.
Bruce, 27, visited local hair salons in Dorchester and asked store owners to donate appointments for up-dos today. La Newton School of Beauty Culture Inc. on Warren Street, Gentle Touch Beauty Salon on Washington Street, and Fernandez Original Barbershop on Columbia Road agreed to donate their services.
"I know what it was like to be a teenager, and the prom is the most important night of a high school girl's life," Holmes, 37, said.
"To have a girl feel she can't go to the prom because she can't afford a dress, I didn't want to see that happen to any girls if I could help it."
Josiana Depina, who is headed for the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth in the fall, said she felt ready for most end-of-the-year activities, except the prom.
"It's my first prom, and I'm going to graduate soon," she said. "I'm all set with my grades, but I still didn't have a prom dress."
She left the drive with a knee-length black dress with rhinestones lining the straps.
Michelle Brown, the senior class adviser, said girls have used Belle of the Ball, a national nonprofit dedicated to helping young women cut the cost of attending the prom by finding them dresses. But she said she liked the community-feel of the Grove Hall project.
"I'm hoping this will grow," the 33-year-old teacher said. "The community can begin to support this as an organized tradition. Maybe it could even branch out to guys."
