Steve and Susan McFerran have been preparing their University of Michigan dance couples for the Ohio Star Ball for some months now, and their excitement is overflowing as competition officially gets underway this week in Columbus, Ohio.

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The McFerrans are the founders and directors of the UM's ballroom dance program. Former 10 dance professional dancers themselves, the McFerrans continue to pursue their love of dance by helping to instill a passion for dance in their students.  

Steve and Susan met after a mutual acquaintance suggested they consider dancing together. Steve, originally from England, moved to the States to dance with his new partner, and within a year's time, the couple was married. Shortly after, Susan, who had been working as the manager of an Arthur Murray studio for the past nine years, thought it was time she and her new husband branch out and open their own studio. 

“For us to have the freedom and income that we needed to compete and do what we wanted it became clear that we needed to go out on our own,” Susan said. 

They ran the studio for 16 years before selling it and committing full-time to the University of Michigan's program. 

Steve said the ballroom dance team started in 1997 with only six or seven couples after some international students from the university reached out to them for lessons. 

“After we retired from competing, we had more time to teach… so couples we could only teach once a week started taking classes twice a week and the program began to grow,” Susan said.

From the inception of the program until now, the UM ballroom dance team has grown immensely. As the McFerrans became more involved, they implemented changes that helped to dramatically improve the abilities of their students.

“We [started] to insist that they get with a partner and stick with that same partner for at least a semester, and they start to improve significantly,” Steve said."We started out with six or seven couples, and today we have over a 100 couples in the program at any given time."

The McFerrans now have five teams and work with the dancers somewhere between 16-20 hours a week. Over half of their students will be in attendance at this year's Ohio Star Ball, which is considered to be the biggest event of the year for collegiate dancers.

“Ohio is considered the national championship for the collegiate dancers and attracts colleges from across America," Susan said.

The students not only have a chance to win prize money for performing well, which is extremely rare for collegiate competitions, but they also get the opportunity to watch and mingle with professional dancers.

“We are all really looking forward to the Friday and Saturday night shows and performances with this year being the 40th anniversary," Susan said. "All the extra shows and performances are really motivating more of our students to go and gives them exposure that they can’t get anywhere else."

The McFerrans have no plans of stopping the work they do with the UM ballroom program anytime soon. And although they encourage their students' studies above all else, they find joy in instilling their students with a lifelong love of dance. 

“We are really fortunate that our kids trust us and respect us and keep wanting to learn from us year after year,” Susan said. 

Watch Michigan's couples compete this Saturday and Sunday at the 40th Ohio Star Ball. Join us as we stream LIVE the entirety of collegiate events. 

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