I could not help but wonder if I had helped these girls truly be the best players they could be or if their hopes would be crushed by embarrassment on the field and a large margin of defeat. Before the game, I took them to the end zone for a quick pep talk to remind them of the time and hard work they had given to this team. We broke out of the huddle and the game began. We scored on our first possession and never looked back from that point. The girls were executing every play to perfection.
The Stephanie Hess The lights are dim, there is only a minute left in the game. The team is exhausted, the fans are on the edge of their seats, but there is still hope. The team’s motivation, the sideline cheerleaders, are chanting their hearts out for their team to win. They are a dedicated group of young women who give all to their sport of cheerleading, a sport that traditionally supports players of other sports. Cheerleading, however, which is now considered a mostly female activity, was actually begun by men.
I have never seen her so excited to go to school and show-off all her hard work, time, and effort she has put in this project. For three days, the judges kept all the science experiments to see who would win 1st place. I had the honor of picking her up from school when they were announcing the winner of the science fair and you would not believe who won, everybody did. Sadly in today’s world everybody is a winner and everybody works just as hard as the next. This communist line of thinking is doing way more damage than good to our American spirit.
Everyone was concentrating on Carrolton. When coach named me one of the three juniors that would run, I was scared, nervous and I wanted to perform well. I was running against mostly juniors and seniors. Including last year’s state winner and runner up. All I wanted to do was reach the sub-seventeen, the time under seventeen minutes.
I want to be a positive role model to all the young children in our community, and show them that if you set your mind to do it you can achieve anything with hard work and dedication. I also feel this way about being a cheerleader. I feel that a Captain should lead with their heart, not their mouth. I have a vision for my team and we will work together to achieve it. Each year I set goals for myself, and work diligently toward making them become possible.
This gave me only 3 days to prove to coach that I deserve a spot on the roster. I was supposed to be judged on my ability to play volleyball and my fitness level. When it came to fitness testing, I placed third in the mile, first in push ups and scored high in my vertical jump, sit ups, plank and shuttle run. Also, my skills were being looked at for only three days. It came to my attention that during tryouts coach did not make an effort to get to know any of the returning players and would make remarks to our past season and coaching techniques.
There are side-line cheerleaders and competitive cheerleaders. Side-line cheerleaders are there to entertain the crowd and lead them in chants. A competitive cheerleading team’s goal is to earn the most points while doing a complex routine with anywhere from twelve to twenty members that consists of precise formations, flips, tumbling passes, stunts, and tosses. I do not agree that side-line cheerleading is a sport; however, I do believe that competitive cheerleading is a sport. There is not one set definition of a sport, but a common understood definition of a sport is one from dictionary.com that defines a sport as “an athletic activity that requires physical prowess or skill and often a competitive nature.” I will take aspects of cheerleading and compare it to the definition given.
I had a conversation with Pat Delaney, one of my friends that is a cheerleader here at MSU, about my view and his view on cheerleading. He stated that “Yes, college cheerleading is a sport so is competitive cheerleading.” The reason I believe that cheerleading is a sport is mainly because of the amount of time and practice cheerleaders have to do to get to where they want to be is the same or maybe even more than what a softball player would. Cheerleaders have to go through vigorous, intense training just to perform a single routine. They
Then I read the part of Welty’s story where Phoenix has to cross the creek and she said “Now comes the trial”. (Welty, A Worn Path, 1941) For me, the trial in my journey will be actually sending our girls to school. Sure it’s fun to talk about, but actually switching from being with my girls every waking hour to having them gone eight hours a day will be a huge adjustment and I imagine, a very hard thing to do. Yet just as Phoenix crossed the creek to continue her journey, so I will get through my trial to keep on. What I have come to realize from this though, is that is isn’t the destination that is so important.
Being a captain, you are not chosen to do all the work; you are given the privilege to lead the squad. By receiving these privileges as captain I know that they are tasks that need to be done for my squad to help them be better cheerleaders, therefore I would not be bothered or frustrated by having to do these tasks. I know when I am cheer captain that I will make you proud and never let you down. I know that with my hard work, responsibility and leadership skills, along with my passion for cheer I know failure will not be an option. I cannot imagine a year without me as captain, can