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5 Ways Charlotte’s Flight Club Soars

January 31, 2017

By Geoff Kimmerly
Second Half editor

CHARLOTTE – “One night to become State Champions.”

On social media and written at the bottom of its itinerary for the night, Charlotte’s Flight Club made perfectly clear what Saturday’s Battle of the Fans visit meant to a student section that while only a few years old has quickly become one of Michigan’s most accomplished – and is striving to become known as the state’s best. 

Students filled stands covering one end of the court at Charlotte’s “Dome” as we enjoyed the third of our five-visit tour on a night saluting local law enforcement.

The breakdown: In two years, Charlotte’s student section has come from nonexistent to become a two-time BOTF finalist. As we learned during our 2016 trip, it was hatched during a series of January 2015 snow days, when student leaders took advantage of the break by meeting and forming a Flight Club to give more support at first to the school’s basketball teams and then to all Orioles athletes. The section gained steam over the course of last school year and especially last winter during a strong start for the boys basketball team, and despite graduating nearly all of its leaders last spring returned in force this fall to become a regular part of student life at the school.

We visited for Saturday’s boys basketball game against DeWitt and met with seniors Jess Ramos, Grant Seavolt, Cassie Cotter, Connor Rosekrans and Ari Beutler. See our video below, followed by five reasons the Flight Club continues to take off.

1. They have been building – literally.

The Flight Club claims to have more props than any student section in the state, and it’s a strong argument. They sadly waved goodbye to the S.S. Flightanic – a rolling boat they featured last season – after it ran aground in storage. But section leaders came back in August with their tools and paint cans ready. They built a giant “bird cage” out of PVC pipe to house Charlotte’s football teams at their field entrance before they busted out before games this fall. They created a second giant tifo (a.k.a. giant banner seen in photo below) that makes trips to most big games. And we enjoyed watching again as a member of the Club popped from the homemade oversized jack-in-the-box rolled out after the third quarter. A fan slip-n-slide set up for an early football game didn’t really take off, but most of the rest have been big winners – including the face-paint station in one corner of the gym where anyone can get made up to further show support.

2. They got organized.

As noted above, the Flight Club is barely two years old but quickly has grown into a force – and especially this school year as it’s become more organized. They received a new “nest” (our word, not theirs), a classroom where they store their many gizmos and gear and plan their work. White boards on one wall were loaded with lists and maps of the gym showing which sections of fans would sit where Saturday, while newspaper clips detailing their successes filled a bulletin board on another wall and a mural created by section co-creator and 2016 graduate Lindsey Carlson hung next to a letter sweater formerly worn by the dad of faculty section adviser Tyler Bartolacci, a 2007 grad. Section leaders now attend meetings every Monday and others as needs arise, created an itinerary for Saturday that was sent around on social media before the game, and members of the section proudly wore around their necks “boarding passes” – not that they needed identifying, but a neat show of solidarity nonetheless. And leaders are still giving “Flight Club” lessons – videos over Twitter to show some of the cheers they’ll use at future events.

3. The pilots guide them home.

Last year, section leaders patrolled in front of the section – “flight attendants” showing the way. Taking the reins during games this year are “pilots,” one on each side of the baseline, standing on risers, megaphones in hand to provide the direction for all to hear and see. On Saturday, new leaders stepped up every quarter to guide the section and unify it for some awesome chants including a drum clap during the first half that will be a highlight of this year’s BOTF tour.

4. They’re making ‘highlights’ along the way.

Most schools with student sections can count on seeing them at football and basketball games. Starting in the fall, the Flight Club selected “highlight games” in every sport to also cheer – and not just for the more popular spectator sports like volleyball or soccer. The Club has cheered at girls and boys swimming & diving meets and at a hockey game this winter despite having only one Charlotte student on a co-op team with Lansing Catholic, Mason and Lansing Christian players. The first highlight game was a girls golf match during the fall, where 10 members of the Club cheered from the clubhouse as their classmates played the ninth fairway. And they packed local Char Lanes for a Neon Out and lots of “Strike, Strike, Strike” for a bowling match. “A lot of kids on the bowling team were really excited to see us there,” Rosekrans said. “They were talking about it the whole next week: ‘Thanks for coming. That was awesome.’”

5. They’ve got P.R.I.D.E.

Purpose. Respect. Integrity. Dedication. Excellence. PRIDE is a school motto, and a large board near the gym doors explains how students should be guided by those qualities in the classrooms and hallways. But Club members also have a lot of pride (the non-acronym meaning) in their school, and have risen as a giant in fan support at a time when Charlotte’s most recognizable sports teams aren’t having a ton of success. Driving their athletes to do their best only makes the Flight Club cheer louder. Students filled multiple spectator buses for football games, load the stands for basketball games, have worked closely with the middle school’s “Junior Flight Club” that also got organized this year, and had no doubts about making another run at Battle of the Fans after making an impressive debut but coming up short of the title in 2016. “Everyone has a ton of fun at the games,” Rosekrans said. “I think they naturally thought, let’s do it again next year.”

In their words

Setting themselves apart: “We kept seeing what we could do to make us champions,” Ramos said. “We wanted to know what would set us apart, and we spent a lot of time thinking about that and trying to see what we did last year compared to this year that we wanted to do differently.”

Memories made: “I made a lot of great memories just through the Flight Club, especially this year with football,” Seavolt said. “It’ been a lot to remember.”

Just say the word: “Get the community involved. People want to come to the games. They just don’t know about it all the time,” Rosekrans said. “Social media. Tell people. Literally, that’s all it is. The power of talking to someone is very underestimated.”

Next stop on BOTF: We'll visit Petoskey for Wednesday’s boys basketball game against Sault Ste. Marie and Frankenmuth for Friday’s boys basketball game against Millington. Click for coverage of our visits to Boyne City on Jan. 13 and Traverse City West on Jan. 20.

The Battle of the Fans is sponsored in part by the United Dairy Industry of Michigan.

PHOTOS: (Top) Charlotte's "Flight Club" chants during a drum clap Saturday. (Middle) Flight Club members hold up two giant tifos during the Battle of the Fans visit. (Photos by Teresa Johns.)

Scholar-Athlete Awards Finalists Named

By Geoff Kimmerly
MHSAA.com senior editor

January 25, 2012

The 120 finalists for the Michigan High School Athletic Association's Scholar-Athlete Award for the 2011-12 school year -- including three each from three schools -- have been announced.

The program, which has been recognizing student-athletes since the 1989-90 school year, will honor 32 individuals from MHSAA member schools who participate in at least one sport in which the Association sponsors a postseason tournament. Farm Bureau Insurance underwrites the Scholar-Athlete Award, and will present a $1,000 scholarship to each recipient. Since the beginning of the program, 544 scholarships have been awarded.

Scholarships will be presented proportionately by school classification, with 12 scholarships to be awarded to Class A student-athletes, six female and six male; eight scholarships will be awarded to Class B student-athletes, four female and four male; six scholarships will be awarded to Class C student-athletes, three female and three male; and four scholarships will be awarded to Class D student-athletes, two female and two male. In addition, there also will be two at-large honorees which also are part of the general judging process, may come from any classification, and are designated by their school at the time of entry.

Every MHSAA member high school could submit as many applications as there are scholarships available in its classification, and could have more than one finalist. Marlette, Northville and Rochester Adams each have three finalists this year, while 20 schools have two: Bay City Central, Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice, Birmingham Groves, Dearborn, Delton Kellogg, East Lansing, Frankfort, Hillsdale Academy, Hopkins, Jenison, Kinde-North Huron, Midland, Midland Dow, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep, Rochester, Spring Lake, Springport, Tecumseh, White Lake Lakeland and Williamston.

Multiple-sport participation remains the norm among applicants. The average sport participation rate of the finalists is 2.58, while the average of the application pool was 2.13 – both within a tenth of last year’s rates in those categories. There are 66 three-plus sport participants in the finalist field, and all but three of the 28 sports in which the MHSAA sponsors postseason tournaments are represented.

Of 386 schools which submitted applicants, 51 submitted the maximum allowed. This year, 1,636 applications were received. All will be presented with certificates commemorating their achievement.  Additional Scholar-Athlete information, including a complete list of scholarship nominees, can be found on this MHSAA Website link.

The applications were judged by a 62-member committee of school coaches, counselors, faculty members, administrators and board members from MHSAA member schools. Selection of the 32 scholarship recipients will take place in early February. Class C and D scholarship recipients will be announced on February 7; Class B scholarship recipients will be announced on February 14, and Class A scholarship recipients will be announced on February 21. All announcements will be made on the MHSAA Web site.

To honor the 32 Scholar-Athlete Award recipients, a ceremony will take place during halftime of the Class C Boys Basketball Final, March 24 at the Breslin Student Events Center in East Lansing.

To be eligible for the award, students must have a cumulative grade point average of 3.50 (on a 4.0 scale), and previously have won a varsity letter in at least one sport in which the MHSAA sponsors a postseason tournament. Students also were asked to respond to a series of short essay questions, submit two letters of recommendation and submit a 500-word essay on the importance of sportsmanship in educational athletics.

Farm Bureau Insurance, one of Michigan's major insurers, has a statewide force of more than 400 agents serving more than 380,000 Michigan policyholders. Besides providing life, home, auto, farm, business and retirement insurance, the company also sponsors life-saving, real-time Doppler weather tracking systems in several Michigan communities.              

The MHSAA is a private, not-for-profit corporation of voluntary membership by more than 1,600 public and private senior high schools and junior high/middle schools which exists to develop common rules for athletic eligibility and competition. No government funds or tax dollars support the MHSAA, which was the first such association nationally to not accept membership dues or tournament entry fees from schools.  Member schools which enforce these rules are permitted to participate in MHSAA tournaments, which attract approximately 1.6 million spectators each year.


2011-12 Scholar-Athlete Award Finalists

BOYS CLASS A

Matthew Alexander Beem, Traverse City West

Brendon Clover, White Lake Lakeland

Ryan Denison, Dearborn

Saeed El Saghir, Bay City Central

Steven Alexander Fox, Grand Rapids Forest Hills Central

Christopher Robert Hagan, East Lansing

Alexander Hassan, Ann Arbor Huron

Joshua M. Heinze, Plymouth

Knute Hoffman, Midland

Hunter Holtrop, Okemos

Josh Hoogendoorn, Jenison

Nick Iacobellis, DeWitt

Jeremy Kozler, Livonia Stevenson

Conrad Arthur Lather, Midland Dow

Alec Latta, Northville

Gabriel Martinez, Livonia Franklin

Robert Paul, Bay City Central

Andrew Poterala, Northville

Nick Rao, Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice

Christopher Sesi, Bloomfield Hills Brother Rice

Blaine Stannard, Birmingham Groves

Alex Taylor, Rochester Adams

Daniel Tzou, Midland Dow

Garret Zuk, White Lake Lakeland

 

GIRLS CLASS A

Kelsey Adamski, Richland Gull Lake

Ellery Alexander, Caledonia

Kortnie L. Bush, Southgate Anderson

Jaymie Dyer, Hartland

Bethany Easom, Saline

Yara Nidal Fakhoury, Dearborn

Heather Smith, Farmington Hills Mercy

Amanda Marie Fodera, Fraser

Alexa Giovanatti, Rochester Adams

Morgan Hawver, Grand Haven

Hannah Marie Howarth, Gibraltar Carlson

Kelsey Kerin, St Clair

Hannah Lee, Rochester Adams

Maria Lepore, Rochester

Kelly Lunghamer, Birmingham Marian

Nicole McDermott, Mason

Gina Marie McNamara, Northville

Katelyn Alexandra Pekala, Midland

Abigail Rawling, Rochester

Dana Schrauben, Lake Orion

Alexis Stanton, Jenison

Alexandra Trecha, East Lansing

Jessica Turner, Birmingham Groves

Abigail Wilson, Trenton

 

BOYS CLASS B

Jordan S. Daley, Grand Rapids Christian

Griffin Dean, Grayling

Nathaniel P. Gaynor, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep

Mason E. Geno, Essexville Garber

Jeffrey John Gregory, Kingsford

Nathaniel Ferris Iveson, Middleville Thornapple Kellogg

Andrew Kelley, Allegan

Nathan Kossey, Tecumseh

Joseph Longstreet, Hastings

Dan Macalka, Comstock Park

Dillon McCarthy, Whitehall

Jacob Mineau, Marysville

Nick Huston Parnell, Spring Lake

Caleb Pung, Portland

Craig Zebell, Dowagiac

Alan Zhen, Livonia Clarenceville

 

GIRLS CLASS B

Sara Marie Barron, Pontiac Notre Dame Prep

Kathryn MacDermid Bollman, Williamston

Julie Buursma, Holland Christian

Kristin Gilbert, Hopkins

Hannah Grischke, Williamston

Sarah Hartley, Birch Run

Emily Kendro, Spring Lake

Nathalie Kenny, Manistee

Keara Kilbane, Hopkins

Laurin Masnari, Three Rivers

Erin Moser, Midland Bullock Creek

Rachel Neumann, Flint Powers Catholic

Brianne Nowak-Scott, Tecumseh

Emily Oren, Hamilton

Miranda Scott, Charlotte

Kaitlyn Stevens, Ovid-Elsie

 

BOYS CLASS C

Zachary French, Ishpeming Westwood

Dakota M. Hard, Quincy

Jonathan Andrew Harper, Clare

Ryan Hook, Delton Kellogg

Kolby Lange, Marlette

Trevor Lewis, Elkton-Pigeon-Bay Port Laker

Gregory Long, Sand Creek

Sean McBrayer, Unionville-Sebewaing

David Powers, Jr., Michigan Center

Benjamin Rebertus, Negaunee

Dirk E. Stoneman, Breckenridge

Ryan Watson, Delton Kellogg

 

GIRLS CLASS C

Brandy Bowers, Springport

Cayla Broton, Hesperia

Emily Crick, East Jordan

Lauren Dietrich, Gobles

Megan Kangas, Norway

Rachel Leightner, Springport

Lena Madison, New Buffalo

Rachel McEwen, Marlette

Karley Sauder, Marlette

Elyse Ann Louise Starck, Morley-Stanwood

Kelcey Stauffer, Sandusky

Isabella Yzerman, Bloomfield Hills Academy of the Sacred Heart

 

BOYS CLASS D

Evan Chalker, Buckley

Evan Dhyse, Kinde-North Huron

Seth Kintigh, Jackson Christian

Timothy Logghe, Peck

Joseph Nugent, Frankfort

Adam Plumstead, Frankfort

Sabeek Pradhan, Hillsdale Academy

Benjamin Ross, Lawrence

 

GIRLS CLASS D

Haley Buckey, Caseville

Kelsey Butcher, Morrice

Quinnlin Daily, Kingston

Natalija Galens, Watervliet Grace Christian

Haley Moore, Kinde-North Huron

Margaret Aileen Ryan, Hillsdale Academy

Jamie Lyn Seppanen, Eben Junction Superior Central

Alexandria Whitman, Fulton