Meeting Her Match by Debbie Millbern Powers

Art Spaces’ Annual Luncheon

Thursday, April 7, 2022 at 12:00pm

The Country Club of Terre Haute

57 Allendale, Terre Haute, IN 47802

Reservations are required, and you may make your reservations here.

$45.00 per person or $340.00 per table of eight (single check/cash payments only, please)

Fair Market Value per person is $18.50

Art Spaces invites you to join us for an elegant spring luncheon and an opportunity to gather with friends, coworkers and other community members in a festive spring setting. This year’s speaker is Debbie Millbern Powers, the author of the memoir Meeting Her Match – The Story of a Female Athlete-Coach, Before and After Title IX.

Powers grew up in Indiana in the ‘50s and ‘60s as a gifted athlete with an unrelenting passion for sports. She mastered her skills on the playgrounds against boys because there were no teams for girls. While boys played on school teams, Debbie was relegated to the bleachers to watch. Playing basketball at Indiana University finally gave her a taste of organized competition, but also exposed her to the glaring inequities between men’s and women’s sports. Nevertheless, Powers led Indiana University to the Final Four her senior season and was drafted to play in the first professional women’s basketball league. After the passage of Title IX, she redirected her passion into coaching. She faced a monumental and unprecedented challenge when her high school girls’ volleyball team was forced to play against boys in a dramatic Indiana State Championship Final.

Her career in physical education and sports spanned thirty-three years, culminating in a position as the head women’s basketball coach and assistant professor at Ball State University from which she retired in 2006. Powers is also a co-author of eleven editions of a McGraw-Hill textbook titled: A Wellness Way of Life. Published in 2014, Meeting Her Match, is filled with heartfelt and entertaining stories of determination, perseverance, and hope. It was awarded First Place in the Royal Palm Literary competition by the Florida Writers Association, and was an International Book Award Finalist. Debbie now lives in St. Augustine, Florida with Jim, her husband of 46 years.

Meeting Her Match, will be available for purchase and signing by the author following the luncheon. Books with also be available for purchase prior to the event at the Art Spaces office at 669 Ohio St. The price of the book is $12 by cash, check, or credit card.

Thank you to our event sponsor, The Hometown Savings Bank!

*Images courtesy of Debbie Powers*

Title IX of Education Amendments of 1972: “No person in the United States shall, based on sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”