All winter CWA’s Jumping Jaguars have wowed the crowds at half-time during Upper School varsity basketball games with jump roping skill and their stage presence.  This week they will make their last on-campus performance of the season on Friday during a Lower School Town Meeting.  The Jaguars will be helping kick off the CWA Winter Olympics for the Lower School.  The squad has 18 rope jumping members in this, their 14th season at CWA.

The very first Jumping Jaguars are now college graduates.  Alums of the program include Brandon White, a senior varsity football and basketball player who was a rope turner back in fifth grade, girls basketball players McKenzi Hayford and Janay Davis, soccer and tennis player Dillon Truscott, and soccer and football player Cory Barrett.  For many, the Jumping Jaguars was their first experience with team athletics.

“Fourteen years ago a student came in from recess crying because other children were making fun of him for trying to jump rope,” recalls Coach Jim Pelander.  “This led us to develop a rope skipping team to promote self-confidence and that little boy, Andrew Evans, was the very first member.  He is now a graduate of Brown University.  His sister, Lindsey Evans, was on the team for six years.  She began as a Beginning Schooler.  We have two team awards named after Andrew and Lindsey that are presented at the end of the season.  The Andrew Evans Award is persistence and risk-taking and the Lindsey Evans award is for the Jaguar showing commitment far and beyond.”

After all these years, the Jaguars program is still about promoting self-confidence, but it also teaches teamwork, goal setting, persistence, leadership and the value of entertaining others.  “Athletic ability is just one of the many characteristics necessary to become a team member,” says Pelander.  “More importantly, each Jaguar possesses a special inner quality that contributes to the team achieving its goals.”

The Jaguars practice after school twice a week for two hours.  While entertaining their audience is their primary objective, team members compete with each other for performance positions.

“Our team is pretty much student-driven” says Pelander.  “We have two team announcers who learn their scripts so well that they don’t use notes and several musical technicians who handle our music during performances.  Often the students come up with their own tricks and routines.”

The Jaguars final event of the season will be the Junior Daffodil Parade in Tacoma on Saturday, March 27.