Ever since she can remember, Angelina Blanc always loved to dance.

Blanc took dance classes throughout elementary school. She showed a strong aptitude for the athletic art form. But her natural ability and growing skills led to a setback she never expected.

“It just kind of became too much,” Blanc said. “Teacher would put me in higher classes, but I was still so young that it felt like a lot of pressure. Then it just became an environment that I didn’t like to dance.”

Blanc stepped away from dance at the start of her middle school days, which also around the time she stopped playing softball.

Her art teacher at the time, Sydney Goldman, had just become the dance coach at Paola Middle School. When Goldman set out to recruit students to join the team, she already knew of Blanc’s background in dance despite the recent lapse in performing. Goldman had previously performed alongside Blanc’s older sister Alisha.
 

“‘I really need you to dance,’” Blanc recalled Goldman saying at the time. “‘Do you have any reason not to?’ It kind of gave me a reason to start doing something that I love again, but with less pressure.”

Blanc, the CapFed® True Blue® Student of the Week, would see her return to dance ultimately turn into her becoming a three-time state champion in cheerleading, among many other achievements and accolades accrued during her four years at Paola High School.

Although Blanc did not feel the same type of pressure as her recent experience with competitive dance, her extensive skills and experience were still utilized by this team looking to grow under a new coach.

“I went through that year and it was fun because I had a leadership position,” Blanc said. “I was the team captain, so that had a higher level of responsibility that I do enjoy.”

Goldman suggested that Blanc should try out for the high school dance team as an incoming freshman.

But heading into Blanc’s freshman year, the high school’s dance team was about to experience a big change. Paola decided to merge their cheerleading and dance squads into one team, combining their resources into being the Paola Panther Spirit Squad.

Paola cheer coach Regina Hollinger retained head coaching duties of the new squad while dance team coach Hannah Hasselquist moved over to the assistant coach spot.
 

Paola saw immediate results with the move. During the previous KSHSAA Gameday Showcase in 2020, the Panthers cheer squad finished one spot away from reaching the 4A finals while the school’s dance squad ended up placing 15th out of 16 teams competing in 5-4A.

In their first year with a merged team, Paola won the 4A state title with a 88.90 score in the finals, ahead of state runner-up Louisburg at 84.55.

But before experiencing that success, the incoming dancers from the middle school ranks like Blanc were on the fence about the change.

“I know other people who decided not to try out because they just wanted to do dancing, not cheer,” she said. “But I decided that I would give it a try.”

With an extensive dance background but no experience with cheerleading, Blanc’s first year ended up being a tough one.

“You go in and everyone else already knows the materials for the games, the cheers and stuff,” she said. “So freshmen have to take on a lot of learning on their own time. Then you put on the pressure of having state, the (KSHSAA) Gameday Showcase, to go and perform at.

“You want to impress the upperclassmen with how well you do, so we worked really hard. We practiced way longer than we were used to during a basketball season.”
 

Blanc said the team would work on conditioning, make slight adjustments to the routine and critique each other’s form.

“As a freshman, it’s scary to be critiqued by a senior,” she said. “But it definitely helped us all to get to the day and then show up and feel a little bit less pressure because we felt prepared.”

Blanc got her first experience with how taxing the Gameday Showcase event can be.

“It was a rough time just keeping up the energy because it’s a long day,” she said. “You put a lot of energy into this and it just helps with teammates and coaches, just the natural flow of the day to keep us going.”

Feeling a little overwhelmed by the process, Blanc felt like the day flew by extremely fast. Of course, all the hard work ended up paying off.

“I honestly only remember the pure shock of us winning and how excited everybody was that year,” she said.

As a sophomore in 2023, Blanc got to have that experience all over again. Paola scored an 80.45, once again holding off Louisburg which scored a 79.45 to take second, to secure the repeat championship.

Heading into that one, Blanc said the team had a sense of confidence as reigning champs, but the Panthers also still had a little bit of worry as well.

“Our seniors my freshman year were top level, great leaders, great cheerleaders, and then we had to kind of build a new team with some new people,” she said. “But we got a phenomenal freshman class that year and again we just pushed ourselves. We took our routine that we had the year before built on it, critiqued the things that the judges didn't like and stuck with what we had done the previous year.”

Paola tried to keep the strategy again in 2023. The Panthers would use it to successfully reach the finals again, but this time with only the third best score in the semifinals. The team would ultimately finish in fifth as Hayden took the state title that season.
 

“We definitely felt ourselves as a team kind of relax a little bit in how much we pushed ourselves my junior year,” she said. “ I think after knowing that our team could relax that much and kind of lose that momentum that we had, we pushed ourselves even harder the next year.”

At state this year, Paola would regain its form as the team finished the semifinals with a nearly 10 point advantage over the next best team, which was again Louisburg.

Paola delivered an even stronger performance in the finals. The Panthers delivered a 91.77 score, putting them a full seven points ahead of a state runner-up Bishop Miege.

Despite having two-time champs like Blanc leading the way, she said the team was still shocked by their performance in her final state outing.

“I think we all were pretty shocked because of the fact we were humbled the year before,” Blanc she. 

Even after seeing how well they did in the semifinals, Blanc said the team tried to avoid letting that result go to their head.

“We wanted to keep that mindset of we can always do better,” she said. “I think everyone was shocked, and it was honestly kind of a moment of pride that we had worked so hard and that it paid off, and then we just had to keep going one more round, and then hopefully it would pay off in the ultimate win.”

At the spirit squad’s team banquet in March, the Panthers would have an announcement that would specifically shock Blanc.

The team presented a new honor for the first time, the Golden Megaphone award.

Paola’s spirit squad coaches created this new award to honor the team’s most outstanding cheerleader each season. Bestowed with the inaugural Golden Megaphone, Blanc was shocked when her name was announced as the first winner.
 

“I wasn’t expecting it,” she says. “To have my overall year and everything I brought to the team recognized, that really meant a lot.”

This ended up being just one of many accolades for Blanc this year. Paola’s student body also selected her as this year’s Homecoming Queen.

Blanc, who holds a 4.0 GPA, is also the art club president and a member of the National Honor Society, serving as Vice President this year. She’s also a board member for the Drama Club, something that’s turned into a big part of her high school career.

Beginning with her sophomore year, Blanc started to help with the theatre department and its onstage performances. She would work on the stage crew for the fall plays before trying out her acting skills in the spring musicals. Blanc also participated in the state festivals.

Blanc has attended the Kansas Thespian Festival each of the last two years and competed alongside her Paola classmates in the tech challenge, or the Backstage Challenge as it’s now called. This event tests students on not only their individual technical skills as a stagehand, but also their ability to accomplish tasks in collaboration with the rest of your crew. Paola took first place for both years in which Blanc competed.
 

After enjoying her work backstage and keeping her on-stage performances to smaller roles during her first few years of high school, Blanc decided to step into the spotlight for a bigger role in this year’s musical. Blanc took a leading role in the school's production of The SpongeBob Musical back in January. She played the role of Patrick Star, best friend of SpongeBob Squarepants.

“I’d never had a big role before,” she says. “But being my senior year, I wanted to push myself. It was fun, chaotic, and definitely high-energy—kind of like cheer.”

After getting her taste of stardom, Blanc is not ready to throw herself into pursuing an acting career anytime soon. Instead, Blanc will pivot as she heads to Kansas State University this fall where she plans to study architecture.

“I’ve always loved art, and when I traveled to Europe and saw the buildings there, it just clicked,” she says. “Architecture combines so many of the things I care about.”

Before that, Blanc is just excited to experience her last bit of high school, whether that’s graduation itself or the lead-up with graduation parties and other festivities.

“There’s something really special about seeing your friends celebrated,” she says. “I think that’s what I’m most excited for—sharing that moment with everyone.”