How would you feel to experience one of the biggest competitions of your high school career?
Sophomore Jayden Burke-Ellis was one of 24 athletes representing Team USA Youth Coed in Seoul, South Korea.
An email from Lauri Harris, the executive director of Team USA, was sent out to schools of cheerleaders on Team USA on Sept. 13. announcing the team’s contribution to the ICU (International Cheer Union) World Cup. The email was to inform all faculty, staff, and administrators that certain students from surrounding schools will be absent from Oct. 2-15. for the competition.
The competition was able to be watched live on Olympic Channel and on the app.
Burke’s team had placed first for their Youth coed division. Team USA has won the titles for the past six years.
Last spring, Burke competed in Orlando, Florida with Team USA and won Gold there as well.
Cody McMullen, a teammate on the football team, didn’t know about Burke and his team winning in Seoul, South Korea. He was very impressed with finding out about the win. “That’s crazy,” McMullen said.
Who is Jayden Burke-Ellis?
“He is extremely athletic and nice in my opinion. He is just a good kid and I enjoy him,” McMullen said.
Burke throughout the years has done many sports including soccer, baseball, roller hockey, basketball, and cheerleading as of six years now.
Since Burke started cheer six years ago, he has competed all over the country at some of the biggest cheerleading competitions in the world.
Burke has been cheering since his dad, Demorick Garrett, had introduced him to the sport he now loves today.
“My dad has done/worked for cheer his whole life and is friends with them,” Burke said. “They asked me to be on the team.”
When joining the team, Burke had to travel back-and-forth from home to Chicago every weekend for practice.
Garrett had been a coach for one of the teams competing at the championship while also supporting his son and his team.
Burke is also a part of the JV football team and wants to continue football throughout high school. He hopes to get a scholarship for football when he enrolls in college. If football doesn’t work out, he is going to try to get a cheerleading scholarship.
During practice and sometimes even games, Burke enjoys teaching a few of his teammates how to do flips.
For some, being a two-sport athlete isn’t always easy to make every practice possible to improve. For Burke, he was lucky with the schedule of both sports. Football practice goes from 2:15-5 p.m. while cheerleading practice is from 7-9 p.m.
Football will always be Burke’s favorite sport, but will still continue to love flipping and cheering with his team.
