By Fiona Musgrove.
Vicky fondly remembers watching ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ with her children when they were younger, often wondering what it would feel like to be whisked around the dance floor by a partner, while wearing a beautiful dress! Waltz forward to mid-May 2024 Vicky signed up for a series of Ballroom and Latin dance classes (specifically for visually impaired people) delivered by Step Change Studios. In a strange twist of fate, later that year, she started watching ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ again and there was Chris McCausland, the blind comedian, learning to dance and going on to win the competition.
Like many of Step Change Studio’s dancers, Vicky has, ‘fallen in love with dancing’. Classes are held on Saturday mornings at King’s College London in Holborn. The dances, steps, and routines are carefully explained by the teachers, making the classes inclusive, supportive, and enjoyable. They are all paired with sighted dancers who also, accompany them to various competitions.
In May 2025, the class travelled to Blackpool Tower Ballroom to compete against a group of visually impaired dancers from Poland, in the Open World Championships, which had introduced a category for visually impaired dancers. It was a wonderful experience, where she competed in the tango, cha-cha, and samba, winning two medals for samba and cha-cha.
On Sunday 3 May 2026, thirty visually impaired dancers (including twelve students from Step Change Studios) competed at the Freedom to Dance Competition in the Peninsula Ballroom at the Intercontinental Hotel in London. This time dancers were able to compete in two categories — blind and partially sighted . Vicky competed against the visually impaired Polish dancers she had met in Blackpool the previous year and they were all judged by professionals from the dance world. On this occasion, she danced the tango, waltz, samba, cha-cha, rumba, and paso doble.
Vicky, mother of two, was registered blind with Stargardt disease 25 years ago, when she was 30 years-old, and her life as it then was came to an end. Although she managed in the mainstream world for about 18 years whilst bringing up her small children, it was her discovery of events and activities specifically for visually impaired people which completely turned her life around. Vicky joined Eye Matter a few years ago where she continues to enjoy a variety of activities, including seeing Chris McCausland at the London Palladium, on Friday 15th May, click here for the article:
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Hailed as a ‘triumph for inclusive dance’, the visually impaired dancers in the Freedom to Dance Competition (2026) performed in front of a live audience, for the first time categorised by sight classifications, within Ballroom and Latin dance. Step Change Studios hard-working dancers were rewarded by winning 1st place in: Blind ballroom Waltz, Tango and Quickstep, plus Latin Cha Cha, Samba and Rumba. The partially sighted dancers won their Tango, Cha Cha and Rumba category. Overall, the Step Change Studios group won 33 top 3-placed medals.
Vicky was very appreciative of her partners, “I was extremely grateful to my ballroom partner, Gerard from Barcelona, who stepped in the day before the competition, to lead me in tango and waltz”, gaining second places in the single dance categories; and to my wonderful Latin partner, Anna, who led us to victory in the samba, and fourth place in rumba and the multi-dance (cha-cha, rumba and samba)”.
For nearly ten years, Step Change Studios founder, Dr Rashmi Becker MBE, has played an instrumental part in lobbying for blind dancers to take part in a mainstream competition and she couldn’t be happier to see this major step forward for inclusion.
“I have been advocating for blind people to be included in ballroom classes and competitions for many years,” says Rashmi. “While we celebrated Chris McCausland winning Strictly, without grassroots opportunities for people to learn and compete, we can’t turn inspiration into action. We have just received funding to develop our inclusive dance work over the coming 12 months which I am really excited about.”
Vicky cannot underestimate the importance of peer support and says: “simply knowing that you are not the only person living with sight loss, and that you can achieve anything you want with the correct support and inclusion.”
Concluding, “Life goes on after all, and it should be embraced wherever possible by trying new things and discovering what you love to do”.
For more information about the classes or to register visit:
www.stepchangestudios.com or email: contact@stepchangestudios.com
Instagram: @stepchangestudios
Photos by Alicia Clarke.