All-Star New Age Grid Suggestions

[MomOf2ThatsMe]

I understand the desire for (especially) older athletes to compete. Maybe what I see a lot of isn't common, but I see many level 1 and 2 athletes that haven't cheered before, ever. @kingston , I don't think the competition part of all star makes all star, all star. I think it's the routine. I would like to see more of an ease into full-blown, travel-the-earth, spend 5-10 grand a year and every waking moment in the gym, all star for those parents and kids who are newer than just dropping them into the middle of everything. Half-year teams don't exist everywhere, and there are a lot of kids who might like to try it, but on a smaller scale.@cheeeeer93 , If they could "try" it without having to give away their life, it might actually help business.

Would you not be afraid there would be more gyms & athletes pushing unsafe execution of skills in order to field level 3+ teams to be considered legit?

 

[King]

@maarazzi then competitions need to advertise themselves as half year. specifically with a set of rules to encourage 6 month participation. maybe only levels 1 and 2. maybe teams can only start practicing in november when high school finishes (not sure how to police that). i do agree in allstar you half to hit the ground running... and if you have never done it before to invest in that big an expense is not likely.

BUT to fix all that we have to get all our ducks in a row in SO many other ways to even tackle that. working age grids, universal scoresheets, and solid athlete registration is necessary to even think about creating half year competitions.

 

[MomOf2ThatsMe]

... is necessary to even think about creating half year competitions.

My elder daughter did a half-year team last year, the little one is doing one this year. We just started competing in January, and went to smaller local events. Finished out the season in CANAM. The kids were fine. They had no idea how many teams were ever in their division, so their placement was moot to them. It was purely for the experience.

 

[JulieP]

@maarazzi then competitions need to advertise themselves as half year. specifically with a set of rules to encourage 6 month participation. maybe only levels 1 and 2. maybe teams can only start practicing in november when high school finishes (not sure how to police that). i do agree in allstar you half to hit the ground running... and if you have never done it before to invest in that big an expense is not likely.

BUT to fix all that we have to get all our ducks in a row in SO many other ways to even tackle that. working age grids, universal scoresheets, and solid athlete registration is necessary to even think about creating half year competitions.

@kingston wants a universal scoresheet? Who knew!?! BTW, I agree on the universal scoresheet. You also touched on how kids starting allstar have to hit the ground running, and I couldn't agree more. Not only is it difficult to get kids up to speed quickly, but it's difficult to convince parents of the expense of cheer to begin with- even half year teams are way more expensive than most sports for kids (soccer, baseball/softball, etc). Our sport would be very well-served if we could find a way to make it more affordable and accessible to the masses- competition fees and uniforms are the two big ones that immediately come to mind.

 

[King]

My elder daughter did a half-year team last year, the little one is doing one this year. We just started competing in January, and went to smaller local events. Finished out the season in CANAM. The kids were fine. They had no idea how many teams were ever in their division, so their placement was moot to them. It was purely for the experience.

specific half year competitions i mean.

 

[Nothanks]

i think my biggest issue with the youth/junior/senior age being 12 is going right from youth to senior. or being able to cross over from a youth to a senior team. that doesn't make sense to me at all. the age should have a separation and mandate at least a year at junior age level.

 

[TheVipersMom]

I don't mind the current age restrictions but I also wouldn't care if they changed it...

But I don't believe tiny should be out like that. My daughter definitely knew and was upset that in the first competition they got 2nd out 4! She pretty much cried from the second she came off stage.

She came off and was like I think will get 1st I said jaylen you didn't see all the teams I said y'all were good but with y'all having 16 y'all weren't completely together.

I just wanted to set the record straight that way if they got 1st that's wonderful but if they didn't she wouldn't be so disappointed! I didn't want to set her up to get hurt.

The team that beat them had like 7 kids on the team and not 1 back walkover... But they were flawless as far as being 100% together! So they deserved it!

Now I will say maybe eliminate the 3yr olds because that was the hardest part.. You have kids having to pee every 2 seconds at practice, crying, laying on the floor refusing to roll and it was rather frustrating. Also the same competition I was referring to above had a little mis hap at the end of their performance, someone's bow fell out of their hair and one of the 3 year olds picked it up and stopped doing what they were suppose too walked to the front and waved it around ( to the judges and coaches) from the pyramid, thru the dance, and the ending pose she stood up front waving it.

You could tell the judges thought it was hilarious because afterwards one of them picked up their banana and was mocking her by waving to the other judges!! But my daughter and her friends work very hard to improve and did so and I never seen so much happiness when they got 1st place at a later competition! I mean I literally posted that immediate second on my facebook that it was the best day of our life haha

 

[rockymountainthigh]

i think my biggest issue with the youth/junior/senior age being 12 is going right from youth to senior. or being able to cross over from a youth to a senior team. that doesn't make sense to me at all. the age should have a separation and mandate at least a year at junior age level.

I think it's a good idea in theory and most athletes should spend at least a year at junior level, but sometimes that just isn't an option. The only allstar gym in my town (the next closest one is an hour away) has 2 teams: a youth and a senior. I don't think it would be fair for any of the athletes to have to take off a year of cheer because there's no junior team available for them to cheer on.

 

[TheVipersMom]

I don't mind the current age restrictions but I also wouldn't care if they changed it...

But I don't believe tiny should be out like that. My daughter definitely knew and was upset that in the first competition they got 2nd out 4! She pretty much cried from the second she came off stage.

She came off and was like I think will get 1st I said jaylen you didn't see all the teams I said y'all were good but with y'all having 16 y'all weren't completely together.

I just wanted to set the record straight that way if they got 1st that's wonderful but if they didn't she wouldn't be so disappointed! I didn't want to set her up to get hurt.

The team that beat them had like 7 kids on the team and not 1 back walkover... But they were flawless as far as being 100% together! So they deserved it!

Now I will say maybe eliminate the 3yr olds because that was the hardest part.. You have kids having to pee every 2 seconds at practice, crying, laying on the floor refusing to roll and it was rather frustrating. Also the same competition I was referring to above had a little mis hap at the end of their performance, someone's bow fell out of their hair and one of the 3 year olds picked it up and stopped doing what they were suppose too walked to the front and waved it around ( to the judges and coaches) from the pyramid, thru the dance, and the ending pose she stood up front waving it.

You could tell the judges thought it was hilarious because afterwards one of them picked up their banana and was mocking her by waving to the other judges!! But my daughter and her friends work very hard to improve and did so and I never seen so much happiness when they got 1st place at a later competition! I mean I literally posted that immediate second on my facebook that it was the best day of our life haha

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zGFwp1gw8C4&sns=em


Btw I meant to put this in my post... I dont really care if you don't like their performance but if you look in the back 2 rows you can tell who the 3 yr olds are. (and this was the last competition so they were improved from the beginning of the season) No offense to them I was happy they got that but I think at some point it was frustrating for the 4 & 5 yr olds on the team at practice because it was the 3 yr olds who sometimes acted like they didn't care!!
And if you do watch this I'm sorry I never seen them hit their pyramid by their self so I got a little excited and didn't hold the camera good for the dance lol

 

[CGAcheer]

I propose:
Senior: 14 - 18
Junior: 9 - 13
Youth: 6 - 10
All tiny is exhibition only. Maybe all tiny teams can compete for free at comps.

What is good about this? What is bad?

Sent from my ADR6400L using Tapatalk

Here is the break down of my kids that I pulled from another thread:

8 Srs (1 L5r, 2 L4, 3 L3, 2 L2)
34 Jrs (2 L5r, 3 L4, 7 L3, 12 L2, 10 L1)
28 Youth (8 L3, 8 L2, 12 L1)
14 Mini (1 L3, 1 L2, 12 L1)
2 Tiny (2 L1)

Under your age grid, we'd have to have an 8 person Sr Team and a 2 kid tiny team. We have 86 kids so I would assume that it would be much worse for gyms smaller than we are.

The only Age Grid with floors that I could get behind would be where every kid 14 and under had at least 2 options ie:

Sr is 18-12
Jr is 9-14
Youth is 6 to 11
Mini is 8 and Under
Tiny 5 and Under

that way the gyms that only have a youth and a senior can place pretty much everyone on a team, instead of saying sorry your between the ages of 11 and 13, we don't have enough kids to make a team for you.

You're still getting floors, while leaving programs with viable options for team placement

 

[Mamarazzi]

Would you not be afraid there would be more gyms & athletes pushing unsafe execution of skills in order to field level 3+ teams to be considered legit?

No more so than unsafe execution of skills to field level 5 teams, now.

 

[INeverStopCheering]

The thing about tiny's.... well... frankly they really have no idea whats going on really. If they were only allowed to exhibition they would not really care. The parents might though.

My parents would kill us if we told them tiny was just expo. Because we have both a Tiny Ex and a Tiny 1 we han weed out the 3 year olds by throwing them on Shakers (Exhibition). So we get a team of Tiny kids who have often already cheered a season with us on Shakers, have the basics down, and are on the upper end of the age range. Our team is mostly 5 and 5 turning 6 year olds. And let me tell you, they get it. They come off that floor and go analyze the performance. "Well I think we won because we had harder stunts than the other teams, they didn't even do preps!" Another kid "I don't think we beat team X because all of them had bridge kickovers and only 5 of us do." On and on and on until awards. On another note, I think more teams should take advantage of the ability to Exhibition. More teams than just Parents and Special Needs can do it.

What do you guys think about this: A cheerleading class? It would be a once or twice weekly class. You'd have to register to do it, not like an open tumble so it would be the same kids each time, like a ballet class. During this 1 to 2 hour class they would do everything a regular cheerleader would do at practice: tumbling, jumps, stunts, motions and dance. Instead of a recital at the end of the class they could expo at a competition. That way they can experience allstars without having to jump full in, and if they decide to cheer full season, they can go on a team already having the basics

 

[lilmonstermaker]

What do you guys think about this: A cheerleading class? It would be a once or twice weekly class. You'd have to register to do it, not like an open tumble so it would be the same kids each time, like a ballet class. During this 1 to 2 hour class they would do everything a regular cheerleader would do at practice: tumbling, jumps, stunts, motions and dance. Instead of a recital at the end of the class they could expo at a competition. That way they can experience allstars without having to jump full in, and if they decide to cheer full season, they can go on a team already having the basics

This is how we do our tiny teams and our half year rec cheer program. Some of the girls really like it and end up joining the allstar program the next year.

I would be fine with Tinys only competing exhibition, but I do think that minis deserve their own division and should be able to compete. As discussed in another thread it seems like we are not getting as many minis as we used to and beginning at youth might intimidate some parents away from the sport.

 

[MissCongeniality]

Not enough cheerleaders in our area. Most gyms can, at most, put together a couple of senior and youth aged teams. That would leave no team for the junior age girls. "IF" they could get a junior team it would be a huge skill range (level 2 through 5 at our current gym) combined together to make 20 at most.

As another poster mentioned the school cutoff here is after the "cheer age" cut off. You have 13-year old Freshmen in HS.

I think you have to keep the age overlap if you keep Junior age division. I would agree that possibly the 12 year old (or even 13 year old) age minimum be applied to ALL senior teams (not just the level 5s).

 

[TheVipersMom]

My parents would kill us if we told them tiny was just expo. Because we have both a Tiny Ex and a Tiny 1 we han weed out the 3 year olds by throwing them on Shakers (Exhibition). So we get a team of Tiny kids who have often already cheered a season with us on Shakers, have the basics down, and are on the upper end of the age range. Our team is mostly 5 and 5 turning 6 year olds. And let me tell you, they get it. They come off that floor and go analyze the performance. "Well I think we won because we had harder stunts than the other teams, they didn't even do preps!" Another kid "I don't think we beat team X because all of them had bridge kickovers and only 5 of us do." On and on and on until awards. On another note, I think more teams should take advantage of the ability to Exhibition. More teams than just Parents and Special Needs can do it.

What do you guys think about this: A cheerleading class? It would be a once or twice weekly class. You'd have to register to do it, not like an open tumble so it would be the same kids each time, like a ballet class. During this 1 to 2 hour class they would do everything a regular cheerleader would do at practice: tumbling, jumps, stunts, motions and dance. Instead of a recital at the end of the class they could expo at a competition. That way they can experience allstars without having to jump full in, and if they decide to cheer full season, they can go on a team already having the basics

Can exhibition teams have older kids on it?

Last year for my cp's very first time they competed their routine somewhere it was like a showcase so it wasn't a real competition and alot of gyms and schools went. It was at a local HS. They had people like watch and give a few comments but not like real judges no one was awarded first place or anything.


-what I'm getting at is PrimeTyme had a team that came on after our tiny's. The were called chicks or some type of cute bird name I think or maybe im confused. Anyways they had little kids like ours but then they had like older kids I'm not talking like Sr 5 girls but probably like 10yr olds competing with them too & I'm not talking about stunt helpers. These girls really performed with them and first let's say I wasn't prepared I knew nothing about it not being a real competition. So me and every other parent from our tiny team was like whattt this ain't fair saying it to ourself..

Which it's cool and I knew afterwards it wasn't a real competition but I was still baffled with the whole thing. However, I never found at what they were so I do wonder if they were an exhibition or maybe some other kind of team? Do you know what type of team this may be?