From the moment she is about to hit the competition floor to the minute before she is about to take a final exam, freshman Kori Kestory sets her eye on the prize and expects nothing less. With a mindset like no other, she is driven to achieve anything she envisions herself doing. All of her goals are constantly being raised to the next level and when she reaches them, she feels on top of the world. The life of a student athlete can be quite the balancing act, but Kestory doesn’t let anything stand in her way.  

“I always push myself and continuously tell myself [even when I feel like I can’t do something] to keep going,” Kestory said. “When something is not going the way I planned, I try to tell myself to just keep going and sometimes it’s hard, but sometimes it’s fun to accept the challenge.” 

Whether its cheering her team on by the sidelines or hitting the competition floor, Kori Kestory is dedicated to her sport and has put her whole heart into the hobby she is most passionate for. Although some may not believe that cheerleading is not considered a sport, to Kori, it’s a lifestyle.  

“I revolve all my plans around cheer,” Kestory said. “Of course, school always comes first, but if I want to make plans with my friends, I have to make sure that I don’t have cheer practice that day or a game.” 

Even though Kestory may make it appear easy, there are several challenges she faces daily while trying to balance the job of cheering on two entirely different teams. On top of all the cheerleading, she faces some hardships trying to juggle an AP class in there as well. 

“Being a student athlete, I find that after school there’s not much time to do your homework, so I have stay up later than I normally would if I didn’t have two cheer teams and since I take an AP class I have make extra time to study for tests, get my homework done, and finish classwork assignments,” Kestory said. 

Within all of her late-night study sessions, Kestory strives to stay organized and consistently keeps up with her priorities.  

“I have a binder for everything and each binder has to be organized,” Kestory said. ” Each class has its own separate binder from the rest and within the binders I keep tabs. I am specifically organized with my AP binder because that’s the class that I have the most work, so I make separate sections for studying materials, classwork, and then homework.”

 Furthermore, Kestory is ambitious and never lets fear stand in the way of achieving her goals. She is a hard-worker day in and day out. Kori constantly takes pride in everything she does and values the importance of her future.  

“I definitely want to go to college and that’s why I wanted to take an Advanced placement class this year so I could get a feel for AP classes”, Kestory said. “I plan to dual enroll to get my associated degree and I am thinking about being a child psychologist, which requires a phd, so I want to start early.” 

In all, Kori Kestory is outstanding student who truly cares about her grades and is more than dedicated to her sport. She is constantly motivated to do her best and doesn’t let any obstacle stand in her way of success. Kori strives to reach her highest potential in school and at cheer no matter how hard the journey can be. She may only be a freshman, but Kori has already made a name for herself here at University.