All-Star Cheer! Mini Allstars On Lifetime Tv

[newcheerdad]

This part of my thoughts may not be so popular...but that's never stopped me before so here goes: WHY on earth is someone moving up THREE age groups to be on a Level 3 team??? It's Level 3 for God's sake. They couldn't find enough kids to fill a Senior 3 team without moving an 8 year old up? I mean, it's not like she's so amazing she's crossing to a J5 or anything. I just feel like she should wait. I know that waaaaiiittting is a hard concept for a lot of these kids to even wrap their heads around (or more likely their MOMS), but I seriously can not dream up one good reason for an 8 year old to be on a Senior 3 team. Sometimes I think it's just so the mom can say "Oh, my Susie is only 8 and she's on a SENIOR team. Pay attention to us because we're so awesome--way more awesome than anyone else!" Can anyone give me a GOOD reason for an 8 year old to be on a Senior 3 team? (And no, I don't consider "She has a tuck and can double down and they don't have a Y3 or J3 team!" to be good reason. She can wait another year or 2 and perfect the skills she has. I don't necessarily want to sit here and "pick on" a child's skills, but really...she could work on perfecting her Level 1 and 2 skills before she worries about competing at Level 3.)

McKenzie is just an example--I also don't understand 8 and 9 year olds on Senior 2 and Senior 4.2 either. I'm fine with talented kids leveling up: like a 9 year old on a J5, or a 12 year old on a Senior 5. But WHY WHY WHY are all these little kids moving up to Senior teams that aren't even really high levels?

And again, before anyone criticizes me and says "You don't go to that gym. You don't know them" etc. etc. etc., please remember--they invited this by putting themselves on TV.

I've been one of the advocates on this board of kids, when at all possible, competing with and against kids their own age. I personally don't see the value in moving an 8-year-old to be on a senior team at all, for any reason. The maturity gap between an 8-year-old and a 13-year-old is far more than, say, the gap between an 11-year-old and a 16-year-old. I can't imagine that will end well.

But I think you hit the nail on the head with this statement here:

they invited this by putting themselves on TV

Exactly. A million times over. The second that you tell the TV cameras that it's ok to start filming you and your family, you open yourself up for criticism. If one doesn't want your life decisions scrutinized and statements parsed and edited for public consumption, then do not agree to be on the show.

 

[cheermommaRN]

If they would put a minimum age on senior teams we wouldn't have to debate this anymore. Pretty much every sport has a bottom age for each division but us....
I had no idea "window licker" was a degrogatory term for someone with special needs. The 1st time I heard it was in a book regarding a girl who gets caught spying on some other girls, and the head "mean girl" started calling her "window licker".

 

[aggie1983]

Regarding senior teams with 8 or 9 year olds - I will repeat what I have said on other threads - I know that what y'all are talking about are true senior teams with 3 or 4 younger children that are there strictly because they are small and easier to fly. I don't like it either, nor do I think it appropriate for those few younger girls to be surrounded by the predominately
15-18 year olds. But I get concerned when people start talking about setting age limits. Please differentiate between the large gyms and the small gyms. Large gyms have the numbers to level out their teams by age and skill, smaller gyms don't typically. Our small gym had 4 teams this year, 2 were senior - levels 3 and 5 because we had two senior age girls who were not level 5 ready. The gym had 2 options, move the youth and junior age girls that were level 3 up to senior or tell the two senior age girls "we have no place for you." Consequently, our senior 3 had an age range of 9-16, heavily weighted in the 13-14 range. Again, I realize this is not what you are talking about, but if age "basement levels" are set, unless an exception is made for small gyms, it could force kids who love their gym to move to another gym just because of age limits. Not all cheerleaders will ever be level 4 or 5 skilled, regardless of their age.

 

[Just-a-Mom]

Regarding senior teams with 8 or 9 year olds - I will repeat what I have said on other threads - I know that what y'all are talking about are true senior teams with 3 or 4 younger children that are there strictly because they are small and easier to fly. I don't like it either, nor do I think it appropriate for those few younger girls to be surrounded by the predominately
15-18 year olds. But I get concerned when people start talking about setting age limits. Please differentiate between the large gyms and the small gyms. Large gyms have the numbers to level out their teams by age and skill, smaller gyms don't typically. Our small gym had 4 teams this year, 2 were senior - levels 3 and 5 because we had two senior age girls who were not level 5 ready. The gym had 2 options, move the youth and junior age girls that were level 3 up to senior or tell the two senior age girls "we have no place for you." Consequently, our senior 3 had an age range of 9-16, heavily weighted in the 13-14 range. Again, I realize this is not what you are talking about, but if age "basement levels" are set, unless an exception is made for small gyms, it could force kids who love their gym to move to another gym just because of age limits. Not all cheerleaders will ever be level 4 or 5 skilled, regardless of their age.

Yes, small gyms have fewer athletes to pull from. I think most people are OK with 12+ on a senior team--I don't think we're talking about setting basement levels at 15 or anything. But really...if a gym still can't fill ONE senior team with kids from 12-18, then that gym owner may want to re-consider their career path. I'm sorry...but I will probably never budge on this. An 8-year-old has NO BUSINESS on a Senior team. Ever. For any reason. And in this case, Midwest Magic HAS a junior team. So they are not pulling her up because they need people to fill out their senior team. I'm sorry...she should wait a few years. Why couldn't your gym have made a Youth and a Senior team? Have Youth be your youngest team, and Senior your oldest. Then everyone 11 and under could go Youth. 12 and up--->Senior.

And as I said before...IT'S LEVEL 3. LEVEL 3. It's not like she's throwing doubles and needs a team so she can show them off. Move her to Youth or Juniors...and let her work on those Level 2 skills until they are FLAWLESS. I'm big on progression--if she's not throwing PERFECT level 2 skills, then she can wait to move to Level 3.

 

[aggie1983]

^^^^okay, i'll try again. I'm not talking about Midwest. I'm trying to show that there are legitimate reasons a small gym might have younger girls on a senior team and I was using as an example our gym which had two senior teams, we had two senior age girls who were not level 5 skilled. Had they been placed on the senior 5 then they would have been fodder for the comments from people on this board about the rocks in the back not tumbling and they would not have been an asset to the level 5 girls - not fair to that team. We had a mini team, a junior team and two seniors. With the exception of the minis, these teams were leveled out by skill level, more than age. We are a small gym with an outstanding co-owner/head coach who with his 4 teams came home this year with 11 National Champion banners, 2 NCA jackets and 3 UCA jackets. If anything our senior 3 was at a disadvantage with the other senior teams because of our overall younger age and commensurate lower level of experience and maturity. All I am trying to get across is that small gyms do not have the luxury that larger gyms do of leveling skill and age levels. I do get your point in terms of large gyms and agree with you completely, but we're not all large gyms. This probably won't convince you, and that's cool. But as the mom of one of those seniors who will never be level 5, I am grateful our gym made a decision that let my cp stay at the gym she loves.

 

[newcheerdad]

^^^^okay, i'll try again. I'm not talking about Midwest. I'm trying to show that there are legitimate reasons a small gym might have younger girls on a senior team and I was using as an example our gym which had two senior teams, we had two senior age girls who were not level 5 skilled. Had they been placed on the senior 5 then they would have been fodder for the comments from people on this board about the rocks in the back not tumbling and they would not have been an asset to the level 5 girls - not fair to that team. We had a mini team, a junior team and two seniors. With the exception of the minis, these teams were leveled out by skill level, more than age. We are a small gym with an outstanding co-owner/head coach who with his 4 teams came home this year with 11 National Champion banners, 2 NCA jackets and 3 UCA jackets. If anything our senior 3 was at a disadvantage with the other senior teams because of our overall younger age and commensurate lower level of experience and maturity. All I am trying to get across is that small gyms do not have the luxury that larger gyms do of leveling skill and age levels. I do get your point in terms of large gyms and agree with you completely, but we're not all large gyms. This probably won't convince you, and that's cool. But as the mom of one of those seniors who will never be level 5, I am grateful our gym made a decision that let my cp stay at the gym she loves.

I wonder how many other gyms do this - basically create a team (or level a team down) for the sake of a small number of kids. Is this more common than I think it is?

And if so, how does it work? I know we have one team that's mainly crossovers, but I don't think the girls that crossover to that team have to pay much more in extra tuition - just the competition and choreography fees.

 

[aggie1983]

no idea, our gym doesn't have crossovers at all except in cases of injury.

 

[newcheerdad]

no idea, our gym doesn't have crossovers at all except in cases of injury.

Ok, so in your case your gym had enough athletes to create four full teams. And they decided to have a senior 5, senior 3, a junior and a mini team.

I still don't see why you'd have to have an 8 or 9-year-old on a senior team, even at a small gym. If you're stretching that far back to have the bare minimum to fill out a team, then you really need to decide whether it's worth having that team in the first place. It's just way too big an age and maturity gap more often than not.

This isn't to say that you can't have 13 or 14-year-olds on a senior team, I think that's reasonable and our program does that on a regular basis. 11 and 12-year-old on a senior team is pushing it. If it's a prodigy situation where the 9-year-old's got a full, then more than likely they're going to be heading for a bigger gym sooner than later anyway, where they can be on a more age-appropriate level 5 team.

 

[Just-a-Mom]

^^^^ All I am trying to get across is that small gyms do not have the luxury that larger gyms do of leveling skill and age levels. I do get your point in terms of large gyms and agree with you completely, but we're not all large gyms. This probably won't convince you, and that's cool. But as the mom of one of those seniors who will never be level 5, I am grateful our gym made a decision that let my cp stay at the gym she loves.

OK. newcheerdad covered a lot of how I'm feeling, but I did want to touch on a couple things. I am also a mom of a girl that will never be level 5--she's 16, soon to be 17 and on a Senior 3 team. We're at a small gym, and there is a 10 year old on her Senior 3 team. Just to throw some perspective out there--I'm not just talking about something I know nothing about. I'm living it. I STILL don't like it. Now granted, we are chaging to a large gym for next season, but that is about other issues. I like small gyms, and I like them to be successful, but I just think if you're moving kids up 2 or 3 age levels (8-9 year olds on senior) that's a problem.

And to touch on another thread, there is the thread on here about being proud of your level. How on earth is my daughter supposed to be ecstatic that she's on Senior 3 when there's third graders on her team? I can tell you right now, if you saw the look on her face when, for the second time in a year, she's gone to her first practice with a new team and been surrounded by these little kids, as her mom you wouldn't be thrilled with it either.

Ok, so in your case your gym had enough athletes to create four full teams. And they decided to have a senior 5, senior 3, a junior and a mini team.

I still don't see why you'd have to have an 8 or 9-year-old on a senior team, even at a small gym. If you're stretching that far back to have the bare minimum to fill out a team, then you really need to decide whether it's worth having that team in the first place. It's just way too big an age and maturity gap more often than not.

This isn't to say that you can't have 13 or 14-year-olds on a senior team, I think that's reasonable and our program does that on a regular basis. 11 and 12-year-old on a senior team is pushing it. If it's a prodigy situation where the 9-year-old's got a full, then more than likely they're going to be heading for a bigger gym sooner than later anyway, where they can be on a more age-appropriate level 5 team.

This sums up how I feel perfectly, except it sounds nicer when you say it.

I'm inclined to think this has got to be the first time in history a small gym is saying they have so many Level 5 athletes and that they have only TWO lower level seniors left so they have to create a whole team for them. Usually the "plight of the small gym" is that they can't field a whole Level 5 team, unless they fill it up with Youth and Juniors.

 

[Just-a-Mom]

oops. too late to edit.

@aggie1983 I am not really trying to get you upset. I really am just a mom (hence the name) so what I think really doesn't matter--no one is going to change any rules because I think they should. I just have my opinions, and this show brought them out.

 

[aggie1983]

@Just-a--Mom Not upset, but thanks for the thought. Maybe our gym is unique in that this worked. My cp didn't start competitive cheer until she was 14 (way behind the curve) so she has always cheered with younger girls and given our small numbers, sometimes much younger and it has never bothered her. She loves her "little people" as she calls them - she thinks they're adorable and she brags on the new skills they master - that she probably never will given her late start and knee issues she has. One of the things she loves most about her team (and most of this team has been together for the last 3 years) is the lack of drama. That was her biggest complaint when she still cheered at school. (Tried doing both one year - mistake, she chose all-stars.) And given our small numbers, it makes sense to me that the gym groups kids more on skill level than age. To me it seems logical to not hold back a child who is ready for a certain level just because you don't have enough kids their age that are that level. They get frustrated. So group by skill instead. Yes, you might end up bumping them an age bracket, which is the case with about 75% of our team or in the case of three of the girls, two age brackets. Is that optimal, no - but for us it worked. Are there older girls at our gym that would cringe at the idea of cheering with girls that young - absolutely. Are there older girls at our gym that I wouldn't want the younger girls cheering with - maybe.
I guess my bottom line is that on this subject,while I agree in most all instances that younger girls should be with girls more their own age, it is not absolute. And perhaps it shouldn't be ignored, but there is probably a very different atmosphere overall at small gyms versus large gyms. There may be much more of a divide between the ages than at a small gym where practices and tumbling classes may overlap and the cps get to know most all the other cps. Don't know, just speculating.

My apologies to the thread - I didn't mean to hijack it on this subject.

 

[cheermrt]

Yes, small gyms have fewer athletes to pull from. I think most people are OK with 12+ on a senior team--I don't think we're talking about setting basement levels at 15 or anything. But really...if a gym still can't fill ONE senior team with kids from 12-18, then that gym owner may want to re-consider their career path. I'm sorry...but I will probably never budge on this. An 8-year-old has NO BUSINESS on a Senior team. Ever. For any reason. And in this case, Midwest Magic HAS a junior team. So they are not pulling her up because they need people to fill out their senior team. I'm sorry...she should wait a few years. Why couldn't your gym have made a Youth and a Senior team? Have Youth be your youngest team, and Senior your oldest. Then everyone 11 and under could go Youth. 12 and up--->Senior.

And as I said before...IT'S LEVEL 3. LEVEL 3. It's not like she's throwing doubles and needs a team so she can show them off. Move her to Youth or Juniors...and let her work on those Level 2 skills until they are FLAWLESS. I'm big on progression--if she's not throwing PERFECT level 2 skills, then she can wait to move to Level 3.

ok first off we did fill ONE true senior team our senior level 5 and remember were a small gym so doing that was hard but this is what i want for you to do for me please since you know how midwest magic opperates why dont you research and see how many all star gyms are located in the columbus area and look at the distance between the gyms then i want you to look up a lot of the high school rules and regulations that say you can not cheer high school and all star so yes we do need cross overs at our gym and as far as maturity level yes kenzie is only 8 but when she is in the air she looks better than most 16 or 17 y/o i know so since this is about cheer i would have to say yes her flying ability is very mature and as far as her hearing us talk i dont know how your gym runs practices or the atmosphere over there but here we are a family a true family and kenzie is like our little sister so keep in mind we would never do anything bad or disrespectful around her and even then we dont get to talk at practices we come in to do work there is no talking and yes we do have a junior 2 team but our senior 3 team needed a flyer (btw our senior 3 team is like a true junior team on two people make us senior ) so we needed someone that a junior aged kid could base and mind you kenzie only filled in for 4 comps this year with minis as a base until they got another base and once again we are a small gym

 

[Just-a-Mom]

ok first off we did fill ONE true senior team our senior level 5 and remember were a small gym so doing that was hard but this is what i want for you to do for me please since you know how midwest magic opperates why dont you research and see how many all star gyms are located in the columbus area and look at the distance between the gyms then i want you to look up a lot of the high school rules and regulations that say you can not cheer high school and all star so yes we do need cross overs at our gym and as far as maturity level yes kenzie is only 8 but when she is in the air she looks better than most 16 or 17 y/o i know so since this is about cheer i would have to say yes her flying ability is very mature and as far as her hearing us talk i dont know how your gym runs practices or the atmosphere over there but here we are a family a true family and kenzie is like our little sister so keep in mind we would never do anything bad or disrespectful around her and even then we dont get to talk at practices we come in to do work there is no talking and yes we do have a junior 2 team but our senior 3 team needed a flyer (btw our senior 3 team is like a true junior team on two people make us senior ) so we needed someone that a junior aged kid could base and mind you kenzie only filled in for 4 comps this year with minis as a base until they got another base and once again we are a small gym

First, I certainly didn't mean to get you that upset. I am just expressing my opinion, which I already pointed out really doesn't mean a hill of beans--no one who matters could care less what I think about 8 year olds on senior teams. I think that an 8 year old is not mature enough to be on a team with high school aged kids, regardless of whether you're allowed to talk in practice or not. I have an 8 year old, and I know she's not mature enough. And no, we weren't talking about her maturity in flying; we were talking about emotional maturity. There's a reason third graders can't go over to the high school and try out for Varsity Cheer

Second, I don't "know how midwest magic operates"...I only know what was on TV. And since you all decided to air your business on TV, I guess you can't really turn around and get mad at us for watching and reacting. Especially since I didn't even know the show existed until you all came on here and told us to watch it, without knowing what was going to be in it.

Third, since the show was about MINIS, and Kenzie was basically the star of the show about minis, you reeeeally can't get mad at us for thinking she's actually on that team. And competing in 4 competitions is like HALF the season, so as far as I'm concerned, she is on that team. "Filling in" is one or two comps, not four.

And lastly...Illinois has the same rules about high school and allstar, so I don't need to go look it up.

I'm sorry you don't like my opinion. You don't have to--and fortunately for you guys, the USASF doesn't share my opinion either, so it reeeeally doesn't matter.

We are really going to have to just agree to disagree on this one, because neither of us is going to change our mind anytime soon. Truce?

 

[ztaprincess]

I don't care what anyone says there is no reason an athlete on a senior team should still be old enough to me on a MINI team. I don't care how small your gym is if you require pulling up someone on a MINI team to your senior team then compete without the max number of athletes because that one 8 year old probably isn't going to help the team as much as you think.

 

[cheermrt]

First, I certainly didn't mean to get you that upset. I am just expressing my opinion, which I already pointed out really doesn't mean a hill of beans--no one who matters could care less what I think about 8 year olds on senior teams. I think that an 8 year old is not mature enough to be on a team with high school aged kids, regardless of whether you're allowed to talk in practice or not. I have an 8 year old, and I know she's not mature enough. And no, we weren't talking about her maturity in flying; we were talking about emotional maturity. There's a reason third graders can't go over to the high school and try out for Varsity Cheer

Second, I don't "know how midwest magic operates"...I only know what was on TV. And since you all decided to air your business on TV, I guess you can't really turn around and get mad at us for watching and reacting. Especially since I didn't even know the show existed until you all came on here and told us to watch it, without knowing what was going to be in it.

Third, since the show was about MINIS, and Kenzie was basically the star of the show about minis, you reeeeally can't get mad at us for thinking she's actually on that team. And competing in 4 competitions is like HALF the season, so as far as I'm concerned, she is on that team. "Filling in" is one or two comps, not four.

And lastly...Illinois has the same rules about high school and allstar, so I don't need to go look it up.

I'm sorry you don't like my opinion. You don't have to--and fortunately for you guys, the USASF doesn't share my opinion either, so it reeeeally doesn't matter.

We are really going to have to just agree to disagree on this one, because neither of us is going to change our mind anytime soon. Truce?

yeah its a truce but i just have 1 question and i just wanna clear two things up ok my question is so would your allow your 16 y/o daughter be around your 8 year old daughter b/c thats how we see kenzie if you do have a tight knit family than you would understand another thing is if a girl has a broken arm and it takes a little over two months to heal and two of the 4 comps are in the same month then i would still consider that filling in im sorry and yes we did invite everyone in to look at our mini team not our senior 3 team or our junior 2 team that was never even mentioned on the show someones been doing some research but your right we will just have to agree to disagree and it wasnt your opinion that upset me its when your label your opinion its one thing to say i dont think 8 y/o should be on a mini team and its another to say i dont think kenzie should be on a senior team then that takes your opinion to a personal level or when you say comments like if the owner cant fill one senior team she should reconsider her career path thats my coach your talking about and i love and look up to my coach and she has to be doing something right she has a very sucessful mini and junior program and has 2 senior teams going to worlds so why should she reconsider her path she has help so many kids acheive goals and dreams why would you take that away from society we need more people like her that will pull strings to put a team together so she doesnt have to tell 5 people i dont have a spot for you and thats 5 more people doing something positive in their life i love my coach for that and i respect her for that