Nia McPherson is an 8th grader with many hobbies, ambitions, achievements. She looks toward doing wonderful things int he future. Her hobbies include cheer, track and piano. She’s a hardworking student filled up with dreams and things to stand up for.

She likes the rush cheer gives her and loves to perform in front of the audience. She stands for no judging of cheerleaders due to the harsh stereotype they have in the media. 

“We also have the no pass no play policy. It’s hard to pass all classes, so we work really hard to pass all the classes. We work really hard with our sport and grades to be able to cheer,” said McPherson. “People think we do it for popularity, but it’s a hard and fun sport to play.”

In cheer you do a lot of really dangerous and risky activities. It’s a sport you build up strong relationships with due to putting so much trust into someone every time you are out there.

“At cheer camp one of our flyers, Jayden popped up and we had no mats due to everyone else using them so we used the regular gym floor, so she fell while doing the stunt and cracked her chin open,” said McPherson.

McPherson said she loves that in cheerleading they get to do fun stunts. “So Tori’s stunt group was trying to get her up while doing a cheer, and Kyle fell on on Tori’s head, and Mrs.Santos was saying get off her head,” McPhersson said. “Then Olivia fell on my shoulders so I couldn’t move, so she couldn’t fall, and if she falls no more stunts and someone also gets hurt.”

At the games if you let a flyer fall down no more stunting and it’s really fun and a huge part of an entertaining cheer so they don’t want to make mistakes.

Her father encouraged her to be in track, McPherson said. “I love running and forgetting everything. I do the 100 meter dash and I love trying for first place, I just run. My dad was the one who always came to every practice, and he would drive up to 2 hours to competitions, I would stay after practice to practice more and he kept pushing me, I won 2 competitions,” she said.

One of McPherson’s track inspirations is Tori Bowie who competed in this year’s Olympics. “I feel like letting out everything that happened that day, and focus that energy on that race,” said McPherson, adding that she will definitely keep doing track and even try for the Olympics — every athlete’s dream — if possible.

For her college plans she wants to stay in Texas and wants a college who can teach her to be a adult, pay bills and to put some food on the table. For her future job she’s been thinking through a lot of options and jobs. 

“I would love to be a pediatrician but I don’t want to be paying off debts, instead paying for my kids,” said McPherson. “I’d love to be a teacher but the pay isn’t really good, and I love being with kids. My uncle is an engineer and he loves his job so being an engineer could be a option.”

She thinks that being good at school is looking for your future and your family’s.”So if you do good in school you’re a nerd or whatever, and most of the athletic and popular people don’t care about school but they’re the ones going to suffer in the future, like working at Walmart,” said McPherson.

School is a very important thing for her and also is a very good way to get into something she wants to do the rest of her life. McPherson said,”My mom will always say that you get the most out of school, and my mom changes jobs and has a degree but she wished she could do something that she wants. She wants me to appreciate school so I can do something I want.”

McPherson wants to grow to be someone who empowers and encourages people no matter what.”My mom had breast cancer and she always had a smile on her face, being always cheerful.I want to be someone who can help someone,” she said.