The Cinco Ranch Cheer team hosted their first cheer camp in five years this past weekend.
Cheer coaches Amy McConnell and Angie Eller headed the event in which children from Cinco Ranch and other parts of Katy came out to learn cheers and stunts from Cinco’s own junior varsity and varsity cheerleaders. Coach McConnell, whose been coaching at Cinco for five years, said she was excited about the camp’s turnout.
“It’s been a while since we’ve done it, but we’re really happy with the turn out. I have a daughter who’s six, so it’s really exciting for me to see these girls come out because I know they’re excited.” McConnell said.
Coach McConnell, along with Coach Eller are trying to up the school spirit by increasing spirit days, and getting students more involved.
“The school year is going great. We have 10 pep rallies this fall, and we’re trying to get the crowd more involved and increase the school spirit,” Eller said. “We are much busier than we were last year at this time.”
Both coaches agree that both the young girls and high school cheerleaders walked away with new knowledge after the clinic.
“I think this is helping the older cheerleaders in ways that I wasn’t even thinking about. When our cheerleaders go to camp, and they have college cheerleaders teaching them, all the things that they see them do, they’re bringing to this, to these little girls,” McConnell said. “It gives them the opportunity to think about how they are role models to these little girls, and help them focus on the fun part of cheerleading, and sharing that with a younger group of kids.”
Coach Eller also commented saying she could distinguish students who she believed had a future in working with children.
“You can tell some of the girls who have an interest in pursuing teaching, because they’re really good leaders of the smaller children in the clinic.” Eller said.
Although they both acknowledged that cheerleading is sometimes all work and very little play, cheer clinics like these help the cheerleaders have fun while teaching future Cinco Ranch students.
“Cheer itself sometimes gets stressful and demanding, and sometimes it’s not always fun. But this sort of brings it back around, and it becomes fun again for everyone.” McConnell said.
