Venice Cheer

Venice’s cheer coach, Ms. Joana Trocan-Garrett, has been coaching cheer since 2010 but she took the 2015-2016 school year off. Ironically, she considered the cheerleaders to be annoying, until she decided to join the cheer team her senior year of high school and fell in love with the sport. She loved that cheer involved the two sports she loved: both gymnastics and dance.

When she was in grad school, Ms Trocan-Garrett began coaching a middle school cheer team in Beverly Hills as a side job, but loved it so much that she continued coaching cheer once she came to Venice.

Ms. Trocan-Garrett says that she sees a huge difference in the cheerleaders coordination teamwork from their try-outs in the spring to their first performance at the beginning of the school year.

“Varsity, JV, and dance… There’s at least one person, if not more, who has never done dance or cheer before,” said Ms. Trocan-Garrett. “So the fact that they’re able to come together and actually put together routines is pretty cool.”

Jaelyn Lytle is Venice High’s varsity cheer captain. She’s been a cheerleader for four years now. She enjoys cheering because it’s fun getting pumped up and she loves her teammates.

“Cheerleading has made me a lot more confident. I feel more comfortable speaking in front of audiences and performing in front of crowds now.” said Lytle. Lytle is looking forward to competitions and going to nationals in Las Vegas.

“I love cheering because it takes my mind off things and it’s just exciting to cheer,” says Kimberlie Ortega, a senior cheerleader who’s been cheering since her sophomore year.

“If you’re scared to tryout for cheer,” says Ortega “you should just join because you get to bond with everyone else on the team and it’s really exciting.”