Tiger Nation faces questions of what makes a section leader

Year after year, as each student attends the school sporting events, the heart of the chants is led by our four student section leaders who are set apart from everyone else by their red and white striped overalls. Although we attend the games to watch our school take down the opposing team, having the leaders hype us up to get rowdy and feeling our heartbeat start to race gives the game a more thrill. 

The overalls are a really important part of being a CFHS Tiger; after all, it’s been a tradition for who knows how long. It has been no surprise that we have gone into the 2020 football season and already had girls making a point that it’s unfair it is always boy leaders.

Regarding the history of overlooking female student leaders, senior Grace Penrith didn’t have too much to say other than straight forward “a girl has as much power or school spirit as a guy has and can be one as well to get the crowd excited.” 

Although I’m sure everyone can agree with that statement, that doesn’t seem to matter when it comes to passing them down. Senior Jacob Raecker, one of the rowdiest student section leaders, said, “Me, personally, I feel that it is tradition to get the overalls, so that’s why you could see some drama because the past five-six years have been passed down to men only.” 

In recent years, we have had Abbie Lyman (’20) get a pair of overalls handed to her by Caiden Barnett (’20) because he thought she truly deserved them. That came as no surprise to the students and faculty as well. She really did deserve them, and some nights she would get crazier than the boys. 

Lyman had made a suggestion that instead of having boys pass them down to girls, maybe four girls could start a tradition of their own with maybe white overalls that they decorate or maybe they could use camouflage ones. Raecker had mentioned that before this year’s football season had started, Penrith had asked him if she could buy a pair for herself, and he had told her that he didn’t care, “She deserves it because, after all, she is a Penrith and rages hard.” Maybe each year, little by little there, is a change starting to happen, starting with last year of Lyman getting the overalls handed to her and making a suggestion that a group of four girls starts their own tradition for the Tiger Nation with this year Penrith buying a pair of her own overalls to build off of Lyman’s great idea. 

Now, all we need is three more girls that are willing to grow more with Penrith on that idea and make this controversy of only boy leaders come to an end.

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