1982-1986

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Cheerleading No Longer Just For The Girls

RAH! RAH! RAH! So goes the famous refrain that is repeated each year hundreds of times by thousands of cheerleaders in schools all over the nation. Cheerleading is a highly visible extracurricular activity, although many people are unaware that it is also a highly demanding ac– tivity. Cheerleading may seem to involve no more than wearing cute little skirts and cheering in unison with several girls, but that is changing. Especially the part about · wearing the traditional pleated skirt and cheering\with the other girls, because some of the junior college cheerleaders ·today are not girls. East Central Junior College opened its cheerleading program this year to male participation, and Dr. Eddie Smith, the president of ECJC, said the male cheerleaders have been well recieved by the students and faculty. "Of course, there have been male cheerleaders at the i.miver– si_ti~s for many years," said Dr. Smith. "I'm not sure why it hasn't been customary for junior colleges to have male cheerleaders, but we intend to in– clude slots in our cheerleading program for male che"erieaders from here on out.'' Faculty members who have worked at ECJC for many years said the junior colleges had male cheerleaders once, just as the universities still do, but about 25 years ago the junior colleges and the students apparently lost in– terest in having young men in their cheerleading programs.

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Working Together Stacie Therrell and Daniel Burton, two members of the ECJC cheerleading team, are shown doing one of the partner stunts the team has been practiajng. ECJC has had no males in their cheerleading program for abciµt 20 years, but interest in male cheerleading was so strong this year the program was opened to male participation.

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