Cheerleading

INTRO

While cheerleading is not recognized as one of the NCAA. NAIA, or NJCAA athletic teams, it is still a sport in high demand. Tryouts are common when applying to colleges, or simply having a strong background in gymnastics, dance, or tumble is necessary unless one has extensive cheerleading experience from high school team.

According to scholarship.com “In few other sports is there more pressure to not only participate in competitions, but to win championships and accolades to be considered for spots on squads at schools with big athletic programs. Cheerleaders at the highest level are more marketable to those big schools, and the top cheerleaders must not only be stellar athletes with tumbling skills, they must also have a presence that gets a response from the crowd. Most scholarships in the sport are awarded directly by the cheerleaders' intended colleges, although if you look hard enough, cheer organizations and associations - such as the American Association of Cheerleading Coaches and Administrators (AACCA) and the National Council for Spirit Safety and Education (NCSSE) - also offer awards to athletes looking to pursue the sport on the college level.

While there is less funding available to cheerleaders than football players, for example, programs with established cheerleading programs that win competitions will be more generous than schools without a cheerleading tradition.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheerleading#College

Most American universities have a cheerleading squad to cheer for football, basketball, volleyball, and soccer. Most college squads tend to be larger coed teams, although in recent years; all-girl squads and smaller college squads have increased rapidly. College squads perform more difficult stunts which include multi-level pyramids, as well as flipping and twisting basket tosses.

Not only do college cheerleaders cheer on the other sports at their university, many teams at universities compete with other schools at either UCA College Nationals or NCA College Nationals. This requires the teams to choreograph a 2-minute and 30 second routine that includes elements of jumps, tumbling, stunting, basket tosses, and pyramids. Winning one of these competitions is a very prestigious accomplishment, and is seen as another national title for most schools.

TYPES OF COLLEGIATE COMPETITION

Every college’s program is different, mainly depending on university size and program funding. Generally a spirit program will consist of dance and cheer teams. Some universities have multiple dance and cheer squads while others simply have one of each respective team. Depending on the university’s athletics program, sideline cheer and dance are a large part of these sports at the collegiate level. Some programs are simply sideline. Public appearances, pep rallies, camps, and clinics are also large parts of successful programs.

The biggest difference is the competition or "style" each school attends or uses, NCA/NDA or UCA/UDA. UCA is very much more traditional, more focused on crowd leading, less showy. NCA is more all-star style. There are other college competitions (USA comes tom mind), but these are far and away the 2 biggest nationals and each school chooses one or the other. Although very similar in concept, the programs differ in style and routine structure. Some colleges have club cheer and dance teams as well, that often participate in all-star events.

“At UCA, there is currently only one "level", but it is split into different divisions based on the schools' sizes, D1A, D1, D2, etc. NCA has that as well as an intermediate level, which for the most part can be compared to level 4 all star, with some differences.”

“Also, in UCA squads are limited to 16 (with the exception of all-girl teams in which cannot exceed 20) while NCA is limited to 20 in all divisions (plus in NCA, mascots are allowed to compete with the cheerleaders whereas in UCA, mascots can only compete in the mascot championship).”

Each has divisions for school and team organization. All do the same skillsets and progressions from basic to the elite levels, but with variances of style (used to be regional now is coach/schedule/budget preference), with the exception of Intermediate for NCA, which helps beginner or transition programs get their footing.