Bison Cheer Team Prepares for Florida Nationals

The Bison Cheer team will be heading to nationals starting on February 7th, 2025 following their performance at regionals on November 2nd which earned them a bid to nationals for the first time since 2015. Achieving this is certainly not an easy task, but this year’s team has been up for the challenge. 

Arria Bell ‘25, a senior on the cheer team attributes the team’s success this year to their determination and work ethic.

“I have been on the cheer team for four years now and never before have I seen the amount of effort that I see now, and I am incredibly proud of our team,” Bell said. “We have not been to nationals in a decade and we finally got a bid. I think that’s because we have a team full of people who actually want to be at practices and actually want big rewards like winning a bid to nationals.”

Another thing that is very special about the team is their close bond. 

“I think that our season this year is really good because of everyone on it, we have a close connection and we always check in on each other and make sure everyone’s doing good,” Kady Sturm ‘25 said. “Even at practice, one minute we will be serious, then our next minute we’ll be laughing at something.”

Going to nationals has not only taken good team chemistry and lots of work in practice but also many fundraisers. Being that cheerleading is not school-funded, they must pay all of their expenses themselves, which can end up being very costly.

“The school doesn’t fund [the cheer team], which I feel like they should because we’re at all the football games, and we’re at the pep rallies,” Sturm said. “For nationals, we’ll be putting in more fundraiser work. We have one that’s coming up, a pizza fundraiser.”

After all of the hard work both through fundraisers and during practices, the cheerleaders are ready to compete at nationals.

“I’m excited to go down [to Florida] as a team,” Sturm said. “I feel like [it’s] very important [that we are] going down as a team. We’re spending so much time together, and just to know that we’re performing at Nationals is super big. To this day, I still can’t believe that we’re going to Nationals.” 

The Bison will compete in the National High School Cheerleading Championship at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Florida from February 7-10, 2025.