Participants in the nationwide program, whether solo, duos or trios, put together a three to five minute original act and take part in a two-hour workshop with a professional comedian before performing the act that same night in front of a live audience in a regional heat.

The free program, in its 25th year, is open to high school students aged between 14 to 18 and has discovered comedians including Joel Creasey, Rhys Nicholson, Annie Louey, Aaron Chen and William McKenna.

Acts selected from the regional heats move on to the state finals before performing at the national final during the MICF.

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The national winner will receive a $1500 cash prize and a $1000 workshop package for their school.

MICF education and development programs producer Tom Dickins said the competition was a phenomenal opportunity for regional comedy hopefuls.

"What it really does is give young people a chance for their their voices and perspectives and stories to be heard by a mainstream audience and to deliver pretty important perspectives through the lens of humour," he said.

"What we see is that it really benefits the young people that participate in terms of confidence building, public speaking skills and obviously performance opportunities.

"Ballarat has already got a fantastic existing comedy scene for adults but the pathways into comedy are few and far between and the ability to to get feedback from someone who's at the top of their game as a professional comedian really helps jump-start careers and show what possibilities there are in the industry."

One Ballarat comedian who has benefitted from the program is Ethan Cavanagh. After entering the competition in 2014 and not making it past the regional heat, he was the national runner-up in 2015 and this year has his first stand-up show at the MICF.

Mr Cavanagh, who grew up in Invermay Park, said the program jump-started his career and allowed him to network through the comedy industry.

"To see the quality of the performances after that workshop compared to before is unreal, you see some really good change there which is cool," he said.

"The workshop itself, just getting to hang out with someone who's usually a big name and is very successful and already has a career is pretty special in and of itself and in that three hours, you definitely do get to do a bit networking and form a good relationship."

This year's Ballarat regional heat is on Thursday, March 18 at the Ballaarat Mechanics' Institute and will be hosted by Michelle Brasier, who has a connection to the city, previously studying at Federation University alongside Aunty Donna.

Spots are still available for acts to register for workshops with no obligation to perform and tickets for the regional heat are available from the Ballaarat Mechanics' Institute website.

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