UVSC Combines Cheer, Dance Teams Into One

By Laura Hancock
Deseret Morning News

OREM — Be Aggressive! Be, Be Aggressive! B-E A-G-G-R-E-S-S-I-V-E!

Utah Valley State College administrators have aggressively altered the school's cheer and dance teams, by combining them under a Spirit Squad, creating a new coaching position to lead the Spirit Squad and eliminating another coaching position.

"What spurred it was the university status," said Phil Clegg, UVSC's director of student leadership and activities.

UVSC will become Utah Valley University on July 1, 2008, and Clegg said he wanted to be ahead of the game, so to speak.

Previously, the Dance Team and Cheer Squads held practices separately and couldn't successfully coordinate entertainment at sports games, Clegg said.

Crowds at UVSC games ranged from 600 to 4,000 people. Administrators hope the new Spirit Squad will draw more people to games, said Bob Rasmussen, assistant vice president over student life.

"I think there's a desire to have a considerable crowd of 4,000 until we get into a conference," Rasmussen said.

In 2002, the NCAA granted UVSC provisional Division I status to the 26,000-student school, but UVSC hasn't yet been invited to join a conference.

Cheer Squad coach Jeannette DeGraffenried had scheduled tryouts for next year's cheer team in April, but UVSC administrators put the brakes on them while Clegg researched cheerleading teams at other colleges and universities in Utah.

In that time, a handful of cheerleaders told the Deseret Morning News that no one communicated to them if there was even going to be a cheerleading squad next year or whether their coach would continue working at UVSC.

"There were some hard feelings," Rasmussen said.

In the end, UVSC and DeGraffenried parted ways.

"I was fired," DeGraffenried said in a message left to the Morning News.

Rasmussen denied she was fired.

He said the newly formed Spirit Squad director must work 29 hours a week, including meetings with administrators and student government leaders, and DeGraffenried wasn't interested in the commitment.

"It had nothing to do with me not wanting to work 29 hours a week," DeGraffenried said. "That was what I was already doing, plus some."

DeGraffenried did not return other messages from the newspaper seeking an interview.

Carly Condi, last year's Dance Team coach, is now the director of the Spirit Squad.

UVSC's Spirit Squad will most resemble Weber State and Salt Lake Community College cheer and dance teams, Clegg said.

The Dance Team and Cheer Squad will have 16 students each.

Condi said that practices for Spirit Squad have been productive.

"They're more excited than they've ever been," Condi said.

Many of the Spirit Squad members were dancers or cheerleaders last year.

"We're really happy that it's back," said cheerleader Kayli Oliverson. "We thought it wasn't going to go. Everyone was really sad and writing petitions about it."