The Dance ShowOffs occur yearly and never fail to wow the audience. This event is the only time that all 12 CFISD high schools get to perform together and showcase the talent of the school district. Judges provide critiques to improve dances before competition season, and at the end of the event all schools collaborate in a group dance. Seniors who hold leadership positions can also win money for scholarships.

“It’s kind of our debut before we do our actual competition season,” Coach Gregory said, who helped prepare them to face the crowd at the Dance ShowOffs this year.

Camille Peck is the team’s president, keeping the girls on top of their jobs and helping to organize events and duties. She recognizes both of her coaches for their efforts and in getting the team ready for this event.

“Ms. Gregory and Ms. Riley always keep us prepared; They always print out a paper for us that tells us everything we need to bring, what time we need to be there, what our hair will look like, what our makeup is supposed to look like, what costumes we need to bring with us and everything like that,” Peck said. “Especially for soloists and teammates as well; We have a schedule of like every single time like to the minute of the order that everybody goes in.”

Captain Ella Roberton agreed that the coaches are dedicated to perfecting the dances before the girls have to perform. After having a lot of illnesses spread around, it is important to make the most of every day the girls are together. They hold a rehearsal every day until 5:30 in order to catch everyone up so they can stay in sync.

“Ms. Gregory always says that she won’t ever let us out on the floor with a performance we won’t be proud of,” Roberton said. ”She makes sure that each dance is cleaned, to where we are doing the same thing and we look good.”

The Cadettes stayed after school every day for rehearsals leading up to the ShowOffs, and Gregory could sense their excitement. She could also sense a bit of nervousness from performing in general, mostly because the girls would soon perform their team jazz routine for the first time in front of an audience.

“I wasn’t nervous in a bad way, it was good because I was nervous to get it out for the first time. We had already done [the pom routine] previously at a competition, but we had just learned jazz in December. We had only known it for a month,” Peck said. “We’re a team that works well under pressure. Especially when the music is blaring, the lights are super bright, it’s just a rush that you get and it’s really exciting.”

This year, a total of $8,000 was given out in scholarships. Cy Woods had two seniors win scholarships this year, Roberton and Marcella Tamez. When the scholarships were awarded, Roberton was the first one called. She was caught by surprise as all of the girls around her cheered and pushed her forward. After all the winners took a picture together, all of the girls were released and they ran straight to congratulate their team’s winners.

“It was a really cool experience,” Roberton said. “It was just so exciting for the whole team to just run at you and then cheer for you and hug.”

Tamez is the First Lieutenant, the Captain’s second in command. Her job is all about motivating the team, and she puts extra hours into helping out the best that she can. Despite her hard work, receiving a scholarship was still a shock.

“I saw my team automatically cheering for me, and they were so excited; it warmed my heart because we’re such a supportive group,” Tamez said. “It was just surreal to have that happen and have a team that supported me.”

After winning her scholarship, Tamez stood with all of the winners for pictures and when she turned to the huge crowd of dancers behind her, she saw her Cadettes jumping up and down cheering for her.

“I just broke down into tears because this is just such a great group of girls,” Tamez said. “I felt so honored that they think so greatly of me and they make me feel so confident.”

The dancers work together on and off the stage, and celebrate one another’s accomplishments and achievements.

“I think I’m most proud of our unity and our trust in the way that when two of us got scholarships no one hesitated to uplift you and be proud of you. There was no jealousy, no anger,” Tamez said. “It was all happiness and pure joy. I think we’re just such a loving group.”