All-Star Juggling All Star Cheer With Distance And High School Cheer

[cheernerd5678]

We have been doing this for a year and 5 months now..
We travel from houston to dallas.
Right now we have sat, sun, monday practices.
She goes up on saturday stays the night, then gets home sunday around 8pm.

Monday she leaves after school at 330 to make it to her 730 to 930pm practice and then gets back home around 130am in the morning.

She does her homework in the car and any studying she has.

Tuesday mornings are the hardest. She has to be at school by 715am. So she usually goes with a messy bun on her head haha.

When the majors, nca and worlds practice schedule comes we are at the gym every single night for 2 weeks straight usually.

Luckly we have a car pool. 3 of us moms take turns.

Kayla is on cheetahs, varsity cheer at school, student council, and president of the stars special needs club at school and maintains straight As. Trust me if we can manage it anyone can!

Just use the car time for studies. Make sure her grades dont suffer. Thats our breaking point. If my daughters grades drop she will not beable to do it anymore. Its our "deal"

What do you consider dropping? Just curious because my grades technically "dropped" this past year when I started allstar again, I had a 4.0 beforehand and it dropped to like a 3.95. But it wasn't because of cheer, it was because I was taking AP calc BC, APUSH, and AP Lang along with Spanish 4 with a crazy teacher and honors chemistry. So my classes were really difficult, which my parents understood and weren't mad about. Not saying you're not understanding, just curious where you would cut it off! It's super impressive that she keeps straight A's with that schedule! Now I feel dumb for calling myself busy.... :oops:

 

[Onfire381]

We travel 4 hrs one way.
My daughter does high school cheer as well.
We manage it and make it work.
Most of the time games do not fall on practice days.
My daughter has had to miss a couple basketball games and take demerits so that she could be at an important practice that fell close to a nationals competition.
Dont be afraid to use your demerits, just make sure you can use your merits to makes up for them.

I just don't see how this can happen and go to school and cheer for school and all star. There just would not be enough hours to make this work? My CP gets out of school at 2:30 and then has cheer practice 2 days a week 3:30 to 6:00 for school, then has all star practice 7 to 9 or 7:30 - 9:30 (she cheers for 2 teams on all star) and football games on Friday nights. We have a hard enough time managing when the all star gym is about 1/4 mile from school and about 4 miles from our house. She is at the gym 5 days a week.

 

[TXcheermom]

I think it is phenomenal that she is able to do that, maintain straight As and still participate in school clubs and cheer. I do also think her 3 day in a row practice schedule definitely helps with that, expecially since 2 of her 3 practice days are on the weekends, which is typically not the norm for most practice schedules. How the heck do the girls manage to keep up with their school work the weeks leading up to the big comps, having to be at the gym every night?

They have a long 4 hr car ride to study lol
It actually is better. No tv for a distraction haha

 

[TXcheermom]

What do you consider dropping? Just curious because my grades technically "dropped" this past year when I started allstar again, I had a 4.0 beforehand and it dropped to like a 3.95. But it wasn't because of cheer, it was because I was taking AP calc BC, APUSH, and AP Lang along with Spanish 4 with a crazy teacher and honors chemistry. So my classes were really difficult, which my parents understood and weren't mad about. Not saying you're not understanding, just curious where you would cut it off! It's super impressive that she keeps straight A's with that schedule! Now I feel dumb for calling myself busy.... :oops:

Shes been a straight A student all her school years. So I think it would just depend if it were one class or several that started hurting. Thankfully we havnt had to go there yet :)

 

[TXcheermom]

I just don't see how this can happen and go to school and cheer for school and all star. There just would not be enough hours to make this work? My CP gets out of school at 2:30 and then has cheer practice 2 days a week 3:30 to 6:00 for school, then has all star practice 7 to 9 or 7:30 - 9:30 (she cheers for 2 teams on all star) and football games on Friday nights. We have a hard enough time managing when the all star gym is about 1/4 mile from school and about 4 miles from our house. She is at the gym 5 days a week.

Thankfully cheetahs is
Sat, sun, monday for most of the year.
Our games are on fridays also with a couple saturday games. Our sat games were b4 we start sat practices so it worked out.

Last year 3 girls from houston made the trip and 1 boy.

This year its 2 girls and 2 boys.
All on cheetahs.

 

[mecheermom]

Whoop! :D

Whoop!

 

[Keep_Believing]

Any tips for studying in the car? I bought both of my girls clipboards and clip on night lights, but thinking there has to be a better way.

 

[TXcheermom]

Any tips for studying in the car? I bought both of my girls clipboards and clip on night lights, but thinking there has to be a better way.

Mine usually studies on the way to practice while its still day light. Kaylas school is a paperless school so all her work is done on her school laptop. So if she has work to do after practice its on her laptop which has a light. Her phone is a hot spot so her computer hooks up to it anywhere she is.

The traveling and school is doable. Just gotta manage your time.
What gym is your cp at

 

[Keep_Believing]

They are at Woodlands Elite. We drive from Bryan. We love it! :)

 

[Keep_Believing]

Kaylas school is a paperless school at

A paperless school sounds wonderful. Is it a private school?

 

[ashscott41]

Any tips for studying in the car? I bought both of my girls clipboards and clip on night lights, but thinking there has to be a better way.

It's really weird looking, but my dad bought me one of those strap on head lights like miners wear and it was life changing for me. I also had one of the Pottery Barn lap desks because I found that to be much more comfortable than just using a notebook to write on. Those might be something to look into for Christmas presents for your girls as they're kind of pricy. I will say it was worth the investment for me because I used it all through HS and college.

For worksheets and math, just do the best you can. It takes a little longer, but I'm a perfectionist and would sometimes do my work on one paper and then rewrite it out of the car. For anything written over a paragraph long, just type it. My parents got me a super crappy laptop on Black Friday for like $150 and it was perfect for writing papers in the car. I get carsick so if I was going to be reading a lot sitting in the front seat helped, but if writing sitting in the back was better. Keep mints/gum/suckers on hand. If you eat dinner in the car a lot, get shower caddies from the dollar store. They'll hold all the food without spilling and catch crumbs. If you haven't already, throw an extra notebook, pencil, and calculator in the car. It's super frustrating to not be able to do anything because of forgetting supplies.

It's hard at first, but they'll get used to it. Also use any down time at the gym wisely. I always used to read while stretching at the start of practice. Tell teachers that on days following practice days the homework might look a little messy, but make up for it with perfect homework on the other days so they'll cut you some slack. Good luck to your girls! And way to be an awesome mom and ask these questions!!

 

[Ems]

This made me think about that my cps' team only has ways to earn demerits and no ways to earn merits. Hmmm...

I don't know whether your cp is on an Allstar team or school, but on my HS team, we could get demerits but also earn merits. However, people would always abuse it, like they would miss a game or practice but then do something to get their merits back. They decided, "well I can miss this game but then I'll bring healthy snacks and water for everyone next practice so I won't get kicked off the team!" They just used it as a way to miss practice/games and not get in trouble.

 

[cheerisloving]

A paperless school sounds wonderful. Is it a private school?

Not answer for the person you asked but many schools are going 'paperless'

I went to a public HS and in the four years I had 3 textbooks that weren't online, one was a new edition for AP Environmental Science, and two small books that were textbooks for AP Spanish.. All the books were online, so while some students checked out a textbook, they weren't needed. I found them useful for when we had away games for basketball so I could still do my homework.

I had a crazy school commute, in addition to cheer for basically my whole career. Luckily with AS the practices aren't daily so she has wiggle room. It may involve getting things done way in advance, or some late nights (this is how my Starbucks addiction was born). Does the HS have block scheduling? My HS did so it took the pressure of the same class and new HS assignments everyday.

 

[Keep_Believing]

It's really weird looking, but my dad bought me one of those strap on head lights like miners wear and it was life changing for me. I also had one of the Pottery Barn lap desks because I found that to be much more comfortable than just using a notebook to write on. Those might be something to look into for Christmas presents for your girls as they're kind of pricy. I will say it was worth the investment for me because I used it all through HS and college.

For worksheets and math, just do the best you can. It takes a little longer, but I'm a perfectionist and would sometimes do my work on one paper and then rewrite it out of the car. For anything written over a paragraph long, just type it. My parents got me a super crappy laptop on Black Friday for like $150 and it was perfect for writing papers in the car. I get carsick so if I was going to be reading a lot sitting in the front seat helped, but if writing sitting in the back was better. Keep mints/gum/suckers on hand. If you eat dinner in the car a lot, get shower caddies from the dollar store. They'll hold all the food without spilling and catch crumbs. If you haven't already, throw an extra notebook, pencil, and calculator in the car. It's super frustrating to not be able to do anything because of forgetting supplies.

It's hard at first, but they'll get used to it. Also use any down time at the gym wisely. I always used to read while stretching at the start of practice. Tell teachers that on days following practice days the homework might look a little messy, but make up for it with perfect homework on the other days so they'll cut you some slack. Good luck to your girls! And way to be an awesome mom and ask these questions!!

Awesome tips!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Thanks bunches!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :)

 

[bestbackspot]

Coming from somebody who did both AS and High school my freshmen year of high school it was very difficult. I had practice every night a week and twice on Thursdays and Sundays. After my freshmen year I decided not to continue with all stars and to just do high school because I loved the experience of being involved in my high school and my community. That being said, I went to a high school with a very competitive team that placed top three at nationals last year. After my sophomore year my coach made the rule that girls had to choose between all star and high school.

I definitely recommend trying to make high school cheer work at least in some aspect. I never wanted to do high school cheer but my mom really wanted me to be involved in my high school and my community. Cheering Friday night football was one of my best memories from high school and high school cheerleading gave me a very solid foundation for the college cheerleading team that I am on this year. But like I said, I was on a high school team that competed level 5 stunts and tumbling.

If anything I would prepare your daughter for lots of hard work and late night studying sessions if she tries to do both, but the experience that high school cheerleading provides (cheering games, representing the school, pep rallies, etc) is unlike any all star experience.