The age old question -- to cover cheerleading or not?

No.

If you feel guilty, sell it to newsside.

 

My state preps association recognizes it as a sport (they acknowledge non-sports like quiz bowl, forensics and debate in the non-sport category). I'm not a big fan of competition cheerleading, but there's a lot of non-revenue sports I don't give a shit about that I've covered. Really, what's the difference in reader interest between competition cheerleading (distinct from sideline cheerleading) and, say, gymnastics or swimming or field hockey? Where I've been, little if any.

In that regard, it's kind of hard to not cover competition cheerleading, regardless what you think of it.

Now sideline cheerleading? Tell them to fuck off.

 

Yeah, they put their skorts on one leg at a time like anyone else.

 

Are you telling me they work just as hard as everyone else?

 

It's not as easy to dismiss covering this as you might think.

During the 1970s, girls sports weren't covered by a lot of newspapers but smaller papers would start covering them and gradually they would be covered. Daughters of publishers, judges, advertisers, and even newspaper employees can be difficult to resist. Cansportschick makes some good points and a cogent argument.

One point in favor of this might be a way to increase space and resources if publishers and managing editors wouldn't want to take the calls.

The problems are several.

First, is the nature of the competition. When there was a problem with figure skating judging in the Olympics, I was surprised to find that many people didn't consider figure skating a sport. I had always figured if it was on ABC Wide World of Sports and in the Olympics, it was a sport. However, I thought about it a little more, and realized there was a legitimate point of view. Sports sections generally and rightfully don't consider bodybuilding a sport. It's a competition and there are physical demands. However, the problem is that judges decide the winner, and that calls into question any sport. I also have a problem with boxing because of that.

Second, if you don't have resources, the question to cheerleaders and their parents is this: Which coach do I tell they are getting less coverage?

Third: how are these teams picked? I have heard cases where students who were on the previous year's team had input and influence on the decisions. It was not uncommon for cheerleading squads to be all white in schools where there was a significant minority population. In another school, I read of a principal who was tired of all the problems about picking cheerleading squads and resolved it by asking who wanted to be a cheerleader and dividing up all of the games.

Fourth: Unlike gymnastics and figure skating, there can be an individual who is outstanding and would merit an article based on an impressive accomplishment. That isn't the case with cheerleading - this sort of competition depends on everybody.

Fifth: How many people are on the team? Could you have a team with 8, 12, 20? Is there a standard number? I don't know.

 

That's easy. Those other sports have winners and losers. Not just losers.

 

THAT would suck. Then again, in that case, you could cite a conflict of interest if you ran a story on it...

 

If you use that criteria to consider covering cheerleading in sports, you'd have to cover Dance Team, too.

 

This timely because the county cheer championships in my area are coming up and I've been trying to figure out what to do. Last year we covered it, because it was the first time they did a county championship in cheerleading, and we've got a good-sized county (more than 20 schools). So we sort of had a "hook" to hang the story on, and I would have been questioned to no end by my boss if we didn't go. So one of my writers went, but hated every minute of it, and we ended up with lots of photos we couldn't use. And no, I don't have any of them to share.

I got an e-mail asking about covering this year's event, and I don't really want to do it. I'm going to try to pass it along to another department, but after doing it last year, we're probably stuck with it. For others who are in the same boat, I think we have to find ways to featurize it. Write the angles, like how they train, how the judging is done, whether any of them are interested in getting cheerleading scholarships to college (which is a real thing, for those who aren't aware). But there are some good insights here on how to argue with the higher-ups ... if we cover this in sports, do we cover the battle of the bands and the debate championships, too? Great point.

 

Right answer.

 

OK, clear something up for me.

in his second graf, he said it's now officially recognized as a sport by the state association. So all of you talking about how it's not a sport...how so?

 

Do we cover hopscotch if the state association decides to recognize it, too?

"OK, meet at my house tomorrow night at 8 to pick the All-Area Hopscotch Team. I'll bring the Jack Daniels."