By Jessica Stamp
Youngstown State University’s club sports has added a new club to the list: gymnastics.
Miranda Butterfield, sophomore respiratory care major, is the president of the gymnastics club and hopes to recruit more students with gymnastics experience.
“For right now, it’s for former gymnasts who miss doing the sport and miss competing and being around people in that environment,” Butterfield said.
Butterfield feels being a part of the club will help her and the members grow a healthy support system and learn to lean on one another.
“It’ll help me make lots of connections on campus with the girls in the club and their connections outside of campus. I think it’s going to be a good support system to have and it’ll just be a nice little break from all the studying and the classes and everything,” Butterfield said.
Since last year, Butterfield has been in contact with Domonique Sak, club sports coordinator, in trying to come up with a way to allow students with no gymnastics experience to join the club.
She aims to bring more understanding and respect for the sport and to show people how special it is to be in the environment.
“Not everyone realizes the different challenges and the different aspects that go into it,” Butterfield said. “I’m just hoping to give them some variety, give them a new perspective of what it means to be a gymnast, what it means to be able to do those skills and everything behind it.”
When the club was forming, she said she was surprised at the amount of former gymnasts and inexperienced students who were interested to join in the sport on campus.
“I didn’t realize how many former gymnasts were on campus, and I didn’t realize how many inexperienced people were actually interested in learning stuff, whether it was just as simple as a split or forward roll,” Butterfield said. “It really surprised me. I thought it was going to be very difficult to get members.”
So far, the club has recruited about seven members.