High School: Madison Central High School
Coach: Karen Feldhaus
Address: Richmond , KY
Mascot: Indians
School Colors: Red, White, and Royal Blue
Years Coaching: 30 Years
Advice for new cheerleading coaches: Be who you are. Have your own style. Organization and discipline are the key to any organization. Make your expectations for rules and behavior clear.
How do you motivate your team: The first Monday of every month is motivational Monday. I let the girls plan it. Sometimes it’s a speech, a poem, or a team building game. We take that time to map out the month. We talk about events that are happening that month. We plan community service events. This year we did a campus clean up with the football team and a pumpkin run for cancer. I want my team to walk away feeling better than when we started.
Top Safety Tips: Provide yourself adequate training. Rules are changing. Keep up on the rules. Depend on your staff. You don’t know everything but you can find the people that do. Attend coaching clinics. We do 2 lock ins a season to help less experienced teams. It gives everyone a chance to learn from other teams. It helps with self esteem. There are lots of ways to share knowledge and network. I start every cheer season and pretend the girls know nothing. I teach them everything about safety from the beginning. They need to learn the progression of stunts.
Favorite thing to teach/ coach: The games! Our focus is to support our athletes. We are school ambassadors. I like to take the time to work on motions and technique. I like the team to lead the crowd. It’s fun to change up what we do for games. We like to switch up our pregame set to get the crowd involved.
When I’m searching online for cheer stuff I’m usually looking for: Tumbling, strength exercises, and team building ideas for the younger athletes. I also go online when I’m stumped on stunting or skill building. It really depends on the needs of the athletes and the needs of the program. You set yourself up for success or failure. You want to have a positive space for teams to excel.
