[BGHS 83]

Okay...I am a Bowling Green HS alum cheerleader who now coaches in South Dakota. SD is way behind the times when it comes to cheer. The good Varsity squads resemble our middle school squads and the others look like elementary schools. SD started sanctioning cheer as a sport about 2 years ago. It isn't a good idea. We are not sanctioned yet, so the only way my girls got to compete this year was to go to NCA and UCA comps 7 hours away. They earned bids to both Nationals...still perplexed by that, but that is bc the squads in the nearby areas are not very good. And we will be at the NCA Open Nationals in Louisville next weekend. Now...if we get sanctioned, we can never do this again! We can ONLY compete (during football season) against other sanctioned SD schools. Yes, there is a state tournament at the end, but it nothing like competing at UCA comps and nationals. Why are we doing NCA?? Because they have never competed before and I wanted them to start out without being totally overwhelmed at a UCA Nationals.
My girls have worked very hard to get to where they are. They lost two tumblers before their first comp, two of their best fliers a couple of weeks ago due to rules violations, and another flyer last night. So basically, we have a brand new flyer starting this week and our tumbling is almost non-existent! And 3 out of my 4 flyers are freshmen. Oh..and you don't cheer in SD until 9th grade! So they had never done a motion before this year and I have 7 fresh out of 16 squad members. But, they have decided to overcome adversity, revamp their routine tonight and just have fun in KY. It will give them experience competing and they will get to see some wonderful squads from KY!!
We have fundraised for everything in a low-socioeconomical town. We probably can't do that every year. If we get sanctioned, we will get some money from the school, but limited competition, and more rules than we want...no practicing after tryouts, only 4 weeklong contacts during the whole summer IF they are camps open to other schools, only 3 to club squad on one team (no clubs here), the list goes on and it is ridiculous!! No practices in the summer at all except for those 4 contact/camps. And...our season starts 2 weeks before school even starts! How in the world can you get a decent routine ready for comp in only 4 weeks...one of which is UCA camp? And when they proposed a sport cheer budget..guess how much they budgeted for a cheer routine! $100.00!! What??? More like $4500.00...hello!! And basket tosses are illegal here now! And many nit-picky state rules. Being sanctioned as a sport is okay for places like SD where there are no other state competitions, but in KY...NO WAY!! You will just hate it!! Sorry for such a long post and going off tangent.