Cheerleading

Cheerleading is a well known tradition for sporting events in America, offering us a variety of chants, cheers, and routines to get the crowd moving as well as providing us with some great entertainment. The first cheerleading squad was introduced in 1884 at Princeton University to help support their football team. By 1919 it had grown with the college football sector to become part of all major colleges. In fact, many students were making their decision as to what college to attend based on if it had a football team and cheerleaders than if it was a school where they could get a quality education!

Pompoms were added as part of the cheerleading uniform in 1960 to help squads stand out from the competition and to add flare to their new routines. By 1970 cheerleading had moved into other sports including basketball. With so many sporting events, cheerleading squads had to come up with original material as they didn’t want to show the crowd the same moves at every event.

In the early 1980’s cheerleading began incorporating stunts, dance moves, and the famous pyramids. This brought them to the spotlight and cheerleading became recognized as a sport itself with some of the best athletes being on the squads throughout the country. Today there are even cheerleading scholarships to help pay for college to the best athletes in this sport.

Since cheerleaders were in the spotlight school officials began encouraging them to take leadership roles in activities and on campus. The reputation of cheerleaders is well known still today with small children mocking the moves they see and serious cheerleaders working hard to bring fresh materials into their routines to please the crowds and to win competitions.

This was also the same period of time when state and National cheerleading competitions began taking place. The biggest competition each year is held in Orlando Florida at Walt Disney World. The top cheerleading squads from the United States and all over the world come to compete. There are even teams who aren’t affiliated with any school who participate in these cheerleading competitions. The guidelines are very strict as to the number of people on the team, the length of their performance, the age of their team members, and the moves they can use in their routines.