High School High School Cheer 101

[HotcheerJazmine]

Hi All!!

I am coaching my old high school and want to get them back into competing. Im a coach at Hotcheer Allstars, so coaching high school is so different for me! We used to compete YEARS ago when the gym owners of Hotcheer coached my high school. Ever since they retired to run HC, the competition squad stopped.

I need major advice on starting it back up! A lot of the girls seem really intimidated about competing, but they have so much potential, got to start some where! I need to know about divisions for high school cheer, score sheets and all the jazz! ANYTHING is helpful!!

=)

 

[Tosh]

The first thing you will have to do is decide if you're doing UCA or NCA. I will assume NCA, as it will be a better fit with Allstars and that seems to be where your expertise is. You may also want to reach out to your state's cheerleading orginization and get information about NCA (if that's what you decide) competitions at local HS......then go from there. You may need a good year of just building and training to compete, gather all your information together, then I would definitely recommend a camp for next spring/summer and start competing the 2015/16 season.
Good Luck!

 

[retiredl5cheer]

First figure out if you're even allowed to travel and compete at outside competitions. In MD there are rules in place that prohibit certain counties from participating in competitions other than those set up by the state. MD high schools were also prohibited from traveling outside of the state, at least when I was in school.

 

[MHSCheercoach]

First step, talk to your athletic director to see if competing is even a possibility, some schools don't allow it. Second, contact your governing state sports association to see what restrictions they have on competing (how often, what competitions are allowed, etc.). After you've gathered all that information and have been okay'd to compete, I would determine what competitions you want to try. As a coach we can see all the potential in the world for our squad, but if competing isn't something they want to do then don't push em to. Talk to your squad, individually if you need to, and find out if it's nerves about competing or if they are simply okay with just sideline cheering.
I coach at a school that had never competed before but I competed my whole jr. high and high school cheer career. My second year I convinced the school to allow the girls to attend two competitions, a small invitational in which we did game cheer and halftime dance and the other was a small UCA regional with us doing the same categories. They did awesome and loved competing. Last year, we went for it and competed on the state level, not all the team was committed to the idea even though they knew at tryouts we were competing. This led to a lot of butting of heads amongst the team, me, and administration. Due to this, we aren't allowed to compete this year (although with only 5 girls I wouldn't have anyways). For this school, doing a whole competition routine is too much for them to handle or want to handle. I look back and wish I would have just kept them in gameday cheer categories and done the UCA competitions instead as I think it would have went over better.
Now this is not to say my team wasn't talented last year, they were. It's not to say that my very small team now isn't just as talented, they most certainly are, but not everyone wants to compete. Now, I have a team of 5 that want to compete but numbers don't work in our favor so instead we are working on skills needed for the cheer competitions they have at a couple basketball tournaments in hopes of placing well there.
Good luck!!