After a long season of hard work, the varsity cheer team had their final competition on October 18. Earlier this month, the team went to Semifinals and got fourth place out of six teams.  After the semifinal competition, all the cheer teams go to Finals, but only the top four move on to Regionals. They placed fifth at Finals this year. The school has not gone to a Regionals for the past four years.

Cheerleading starts in fall but continues on into winter, which means that the cheer team will cheer for football now, and soon basketball when it starts. They are considered different sports since they are in two seasons. Also, the winter season does not have the competitions that happen in the fall. This means that there is another round of tryouts and a different practice schedule. “They look for different things among the two seasons,” freshman and varsity cheerleader Desta Sahle said. “During fall they need people who are able to stunt and tumble in order for us to place well in competitions, but in the winter season there are no competitions so practice is less frequent and rigorous.”

The team’s process for tryouts started in August. After four days of hard work, students were told what team they made. Unlike other sports in the school, students are not guaranteed a spot on the team after initially making the team in previous years. Twice a year, there are tryouts for the team for each season.“Basically everyone got together and worked on tumbling and stunting,” freshman and varsity cheerleader Elle Belle said. “Then we learned a cheer, a chant, and a dance and we went around and everyone showed it to the coaches.”

The coaches for the cheer team are sisters, Ghita and Chaimae Haronni. Cheerleaders feel their coaches are most responsible for their skill that shows in competitions. “Our coaches are great people. They have seen us at our worst and at our best,” Sahle said. “They encourage us in a positive way and make us want to get [it] right consistently.”

Members of the cheer team felt they did well throughout the season and are excited to start back again in winter. Although they have to work hard, they enjoy being together as a team. “I really love the awesome and talented teammates we have,” sophomore and varsity cheerleader Katie Brown said. “It’s really stressful at times and it’s really easy to get frustrated, but at the end of the day my teammates are like my family.”