During the first practice after tryouts for the girls gymnastics team her freshman year, sophomore Taryn Sorensen was hanging around the inflatable air rollers with the rest of her teammates. As she stood around in her leotard and sweat set, Sorensen wondered why everyone was split into three groups. After asking an upperclassman what the groups meant, Sorensen learned that each was to represent the freshman/sophomore, junior varsity and varsity teams. Sorensen realized what team she was sorted into and came to the understanding that she had just made varsity as a freshman.
“All my friends who I do club with said I’d make varsity, but I didn’t believe them,” Sorensen said. “When I found out it felt pretty good, though.”
Although the moment itself was anticlimactic according to Sorensen, it was still incredibly special for her to find out she had made varsity after doing gymnastics for 15 years. Unfortunately, though, young gymnasts may not be able to experience moments like these in the future.
In June 2023, the Illinois High School Association (IHSA) removed boys gymnastics from their state series due to low participation rates. Only 40 out of 800 member schools were participating in the sport at that time, a number falling below IHSA’s 7% requirement. Other sports around this time, like football and basketball, had also experienced a previous participation decrease due to COVID-19, but unlike those sports, boys gymnastics was unable to resurface.
This same trend can be seen for girls gymnastics in recent years. While not to the same extent, the popularity for girls gymnastics in high school has decreased over the last couple decades. According to IHSA, the number of schools entered for the girls gymnastics state series have dropped significantly since the sport’s first state series in 1977. In the 1989-90 season, 106 schools were entered for state, while only 72 schools were entered for the 2024-25 season. This is a 32% decrease in participation over the past 36 years.
When head girls gymnastics coach Monica Donner attended Prospect in 2008, the sport was very popular. With schools like Hersey and Barrington taking steps to getting rid of the sport by removing their gymnastics rooms due to no longer utilizing the space in, Donner worries more about the future of the team.
“It makes me nervous and sad,” Donner said. “[Coaching this team] is how I keep gymnastics as a part of my life.”
This decline in popularity is especially upsetting for gymnasts like Sorensen because of the close relationship she shares with her teammates. From frequent dinners after meets to constant hangouts outside of practice, the team has a very close bond.
“All of the girls [on varsity] were two years older than me, but they were all so nice to me and I felt like I belonged,” Sorensen said.
Other varsity gymnasts on the team, like senior Liv McGee, agree the team has an incredibly strong dynamic. McGee expressed that since joining her sophomore year, the team has grown closer than ever. The upperclassmen on the team love hanging out with the freshmen and sophomores and will even give the younger girls rides home when they need them.
“We’re a very close-knit team,” McGee said. “We already go to each other with our problems [even though the] season hasn’t started yet. We’re just like a family.”
It’s important to note IHSA rules also prevent athletes from participating in an outside team at the same time their high school season is going on. This causes many gymnasts to stick with their clubs instead of joining the team, so they don’t break these rules and so they can improve upon their skills separately. Sorensen, being a club gymnast too, thinks high school is much more fun and would rather participate there than club.
“High school gymnastics is probably one of my favorite seasons and it’s just such a good environment,” Sorensen said.
Considering this passion, Sorensen knew she had to do what she could to keep the sport’s participation up. With the team usually standing around 20-25 girls each year and there being 22 girls last season, Sorensen credits this to her convincing a lot of her friends to join, one of these being sophomore Julia Raitano.
Raitano hadn’t even considered joining the team until Sorensen and a few other friends persuaded her. Not having done gymnastics since she was younger, Raitano was unsure of her skills going into tryouts. After making the freshman/sophomore team, Raitano says high school gymnastics is a lot less demanding.
“If people wanted something that’s more low-stakes they’d rather do high school [gymnastics],” Raitano said. “So if they didn’t have the option for high school it would be annoying and a loss of opportunity.”
Sorensen and Donner both think the popularity for girls’ high school gymnastics might be decreasing since some people are just too scared to try out. Although this can be true for most sports, gymnastics can come off especially intimidating with the intense tumbling and daunting flips if prospective gymnasts don’t even know the basics. Donner hopes this drawback doesn’t discourage people from trying.
“[Students] are shocked when I write on [flyers] ‘no experience,’” Donner said.
“They come in and they’re like, ‘I’ve never done gymnastics,’ and I’m like, ‘That’s absolutely fine.’”
Other reasons why this sport is losing participation in schools include the misconceptions surrounding club versus high school gymnastics. According to Donner, who also used to coach club, many gymnasts think they won’t receive scholarships in gymnastics if they do it through school. Donner thinks while more club gymnasts might receive scholarships because of their intense, individualized, year-round practice, high school gymnasts can put in just as much effort and still compete in Division I programs.
“We still work hard by all means,” Donner said. “We’re not just laughing and sitting on our butts all day. We work hard, but we also still have fun.”
Considering the team will be losing 12 seniors after this season, one of their bigger losses considering they only usually lose 4-5, the coaches and team will need to work hard to keep the program alive. Although Donner and the girls do what they can with open gyms, announcements and attempt to promote the team through word of mouth, Donner is still unsure about the results.
“I’ll be honest with you, I want to say that we will be here forever but over time it will fade out, unfortunately,” Donner said.
Sorensen and Raitano agree the team will most likely continue to decline in popularity due to this lack of promotion. McGee believes the popularity for the sport comes in waves, and gymnastics is popular in some years while not as much in others. All three can agree, though, that the sport is a lot of fun and they hope more people will continue to encourage it.
“I know that some girls are nervous about gymnastics in the beginning, but I want it to be very welcoming, no experience necessary,” Donner said. “We work with you, and overall, it is really just to have fun.”
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