What Cheerleading Taught Me by Michelle

What Cheerleading Taught Me by Michelle - September 2015 Scholarship Essay

In my experience, sports and athletic activities help to shape a person by instilling in them positive attributes that will help them in their future. For me, being an all-star cheerleader has made me who I am. Cheerleading has had an incredibly powerful impact on my life as it has taught me the meaning of hard work, teamwork, and perseverance, as it relates to these and many other attributes needed to be successful in both cheerleading and throughout life.
Before I found cheerleading, I lacked motivation and a strong work ethic. In elementary school, I was a mediocre student—and the worst part was, I was alright with that! Once I started cheerleading in sixth grade, I found that I could no longer settle for mediocrity. In order to continuously improve and gain new skills, I realized that I would have to practice as much as possible in order to achieve my goals. It was not too long after that I had discovered that if I had this same mentality for school, then I could become a better student too.
From cheerleading for so many years, I have learned that in order to be successful, I needed to learn to trust and work with others. When I first started, I had little understanding of this concept, as I had previously been a gymnast. Gymnastics differs from cheerleading in the sense that gymnastics is an individual sport: there was no one I needed to rely on besides myself. Learning to work as a team-player took time, but eventually, I found that what was best for my team was more important than my individual needs.
Over the past seven years, I have blossomed into a hard-working team-player. Cheerleading has given me the skills I need to be successful as an athlete, student and person--skills which will lead me to success through college and into the real world.