This article was written by Keegan Breuker
Exchange students provide families and newly found friends with a whole lot of change, but the change they experience swapping cultures creates quite a shock. For four foreign students this year, the culture shock cure is Friday night lights, cheer poms, practice and performances.
Virginia Gaetani Lovatelli, Irene Digoncelli, Isabella Garces Negrillo, and Irene Pulido Varas; your four exchange students on the Northview cheerleading team. The girls have been on the team for four weeks now, and have cheered at the Vicksburg game, a thrilling 23-21 win, as well as traveling to Sparta for a 49-0 blowout. The exchange girls on this team are not only kind, but resilient, patient, and hardworking. These students come from all across Europe, including Spain and Italy, and provide a vast range of culture and tradition to the cheerleading community. Within their first three weeks on the sideline, the team has come together to create the best year possible for the students.
Cheer is a sport that unites students worldwide through many ways. It is portrayed through movies globally as “The American Dream”, which acts as an intriguing pull into the world of Northview Cheer for these Europeans.
Italian exchange student Digoncelli’s experience is unique, she cheered in both Italy and America. She definitely notices the difference between the two styles.
“I used to be a cheerleader before, but I did it differently. We had competitions like gymnastics, and it’s really different, because it’s [American cheer] like more connected to the crowd, so it’s really good,” Digoncelli said.
Digoncelli is proof that the American dream can exist worldwide.
“I wanted to do cheer because it was always my dream since I was a child to be an American cheerleader,” Digoncelli said.
Lovatelli is another one of Northview’s Italian exchange cheerleaders. Cheer team has helped her through the beginning of her experience in America.
“For now, I have something to do everyday, and it has helped me to make my first friends, and I can actually do a sport, which is very important,” Lovatelli said.
Back in Italy, Lovatelli was involved in many sports, including horseback riding and dance. Lovatelli also notices a major difference between dance in Italy and cheer in America.
“In dance, we have a lot of different styles, but cheerleading is just one, but you can do sideline or competitive cheer. But yeah, the biggest difference is the movement,” Lovatelli said.
VanTimmeren highlights the impact that the exchange students have made on the Northview community.
“I would hope that they are feeling like they are involved with not only their school, but the Northview community, and that they are noticing that their peers as well as teachers and community members are recognizing their efforts and seeing that they are stepping outside of their comfort zone and doing something that’s not super easy, you know, as an exchange student, one of the things that a lot of community members will say to me is, that’s just crazy,” VanTimmeren said.
The Varsity cheer coach, Nikki VanTimmeren, who has been Northview’s varsity head cheer coach for 6 years now, explains how her coaching has been affected by the exchange girls.
“There’s four of them this season, which is challenging. We have an entire stunt group that has exchange students in it, basically.” VanTimmeren said. “And just making sure that not only do they understand what we’re doing, but also that they understand, like it’s hard to sometimes explain things because the language doesn’t convert because they don’t have cheer in their countries,”
Overall, these girls are nothing short of amazing. Their contributions to the Northview cheer team have been immeasurable thus far, and the community can’t wait to see them continue to prosper as Northview Wildcats.
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