by Ericka Simpson and Tim Baldi
Staff Writers
Bryan College’s new cheerleading team has signed its first recruits, Courtney Knowles from Ocala, Fla., and Amy Newport from Spring City, Tenn.
Knowles signs for Bryan
Knowles, the first to officially sign on March 10, cheered since seventh grade and graduated from St. John Lutheran High School in Ocala. She will be transferring as a junior in the fall from Central Florida Community College also in Ocala.
She said she chose to attend Bryan because it is small and has a Christian atmosphere.
“I just really enjoyed it when I came and visited,” Knowles said.
She wants to get to know all the girls on the team and form strong relationships with them. She has already attended two open gym nights with junior Kara Leigh Mullinnex, sophomore Katharine Offut, sophomore Kelsey Williamson, sophomore Summer Weiss and freshman Ashley Keeley, who have committed to cheer next school year.
“She has a really cute smile and is fun to be around,” Cheerleading Coach Janice Perron said.
Perron said she is glad to have older girls coming onto the team because they bring age diversity and have more cheerleading experience than “a team of 10 freshmen girls would.”
Knowles is a flyer, the person at the top of the pyramid stunt that gets pushed or thrown in the air. However, Perron said she will have the girls do more than one position because the team is still small.
Newport signs with the Lions
Amy Newport will be graduating this spring from Rhea County High School and attending Bryan in the fall. She signed with the cheerleading team on March 17.
Perron said that she watched Newport at high school games and that she is mainly a flyer with some cheer skills and a lot of energy.
She signed with the cheerleading team after attending an open gym night that Perron held for the girls to practice together. The open gym nights have been this semester mostly on Tuesday and Friday from 6:45- 9p.m.
“When she came to the open gym night, it was like they had been friends, and she had been working with them forever,” Perron said.
Perron attempting to recruit Palmer
Brooke Palmer, a sophomore at Georgia State University (Atlanta), has also talked with Perron about attending Bryan in the fall.
She has been cheering since first grade and started competitive cheering in seventh grade. Currently, she is working at a cheerleading gym, and for the past year, she worked as an assistant coach for a middle school cheer squad.
Palmer was mainly a flyer when she cheered, but according to Perron, she would be the extra base as well as backspot for a stunt if she were to sign with the Lions. Her job would be to “save the person on the top.”
Perron said she hopes Palmer will sign because her coaching experience and talent would be helpful for the team.
Palmer said that she wants to come to Bryan, but it is a matter of working out finances and her parents agreeing for her to come. She said she has been praying about it.
“I’m serious. I ain’t going nowhere He doesn’t want me to,” she said.
Recruiting still in process
Perron said that the girls she is recruiting will be receiving scholarships with money from a budget that is similar to the athletic teams. She tells the girls she recruits that they will receive $500 to $5000. The amount depends on the girl’s talent and skills.
“Unlike some places that just have a club team and no money, we do have a budget for athletic scholarships,” Perron said. “The administration is behind us.”
The cheerleaders who already attend Bryan will not receive scholarship, Perron said. She said she would raise funds if she could because the girls work hard.
“We have to get them [cheerleaders] here to be servants for Christ,” Perron said, whose first goal for the cheerleaders is to serve God and to serve the athletes.
As of right now, she said the girls do not have skill criteria necessary to meet, but at some point they will. Perron said that she just looks for girls with talent and great attitudes.