Weber State cheerleader aims to make impactful changes to sport worldwide
OGDEN, Utah — Hailey D’Lynn Smith eats, sleeps, and breathes cheerleading. Despite only starting her cheer career four years ago, she has since taken her talent to the world stage and gained a sizable following.
Smith, a senior this year at Weber State University, started gymnastics at 2 years old and grew up competing as a gymnast.
“Unlike everyone else I’ve cheered with, I actually didn’t do All Star Cheer prior to college,” Smith said. “I was a gymnast, so I came into the highest level of cheerleading with no experience and they took a chance on me.” All Star Cheer is a competitive form of cheerleading that focuses on athletic performance and stunt.
At 4 feet, 8 inches, Smith has since transitioned into a successful flyer — the cheerleaders who are thrown in the air during stunts.
After graduating high school in San Angelo, Texas, Smith joined the cheer team at Trinity Valley Community College, whose cheer program is nationally recognized and featured in the Netflix series “Cheer.” That’s where Smith became half of the program’s first-ever true freshman partner stunt duo to be ranked in the Universal Cheerleaders Association’s Top 10.
She learned about Weber State’s Spirit Squad during her first college cheer competition at a UCA event in 2022, vividly recalling the purple-clad athletes.
Upon earning an associate degree from TVCC, Smith introduced herself to Weber State’s Spirit Squad coach, Summer Willis. She committed to the Wildcats in 2022, where she’s now studying biomedical engineering.
Smith has been fascinated by engineering since early childhood, attempting to build a flying device out of jump ropes and hula-hoops at 6 years old. At 11, she read about biomedical engineering and took immediate interest.
“It fits all of the criteria I was looking for,” Smith said. “I want to go into orthopedics, prosthetics, or disease control. My grandpa died from polycystic kidney disease four years ago and there’s still no known cure for it.”
Smith said her professors are supportive of her jam-packed schedule as she travels the world for her cheer responsibilities. She said she’s especially grateful for Tye Gardner, assistant professor of electrical engineering, whose class accommodations helped Smith keep a 3.6 GPA throughout her schooling.
“Dr. Gardner wants to show that athletes can graduate with hard degrees,” Smith said. “He does everything in his power to help me be successful, and I’ve never had someone outside of cheer believe in me like that. He’s been awesome.”
Aside from the Wildcats and her time at TVCC, Smith has also represented other prestigious teams to include the Utah Jazz Stunt Team and the United States National Team.
This year, Smith’s skills caught the attention of NBC’s “America’s Got Talent,” which featured her and stunt duo partner Kollin Mark Cockrell in the series’ 20th season.
She has amassed over half a million followers across social media platforms, particularly Instagram, giving her a platform of influence online within the sport’s community.
“It’s my job to be a good example and show the athletes younger than me — and even my own teammates — that being a good athlete has a lot to do with being a good person, because the youth are the future of the sport,” she said.
Smith wants to use that influence to help accomplish one of her biggest goals: getting cheer into the Olympics. Cheer’s scoring system is too subjective, Smith said, which makes it difficult to incorporate into the Olympic Games. So, she created one herself while working with Future Flyer Faceoff, a stunt competition for young athletes.
“That’s one of the businesses I work very closely with, and I’m like the CEO of that scoring rubric,” Smith said. “I created the scoring system and database for that competition and this is the third year that it has been in use.”
Another challenge, Smith said, is that few countries can compete with the United States in cheerleading. That’s why she coaches athletes from other countries. Over the last three summers, she has traveled to 15 different countries to coach potential U.S. competitors.
“I want to ensure we can get real competitors who have the talent,” Smith said. “Cheer has just been in America for so much longer, but every year we go to the world championships we’re seeing more and more countries like South Africa, Philippines, and Chinese Taipei competing.”
She also said the sport needs more solid role models: “We need more people in the world to show the potential of what this sport can bring people as a career and not just a hobby.”
At 22 and in her fifth season of cheer, Smith has already been crowned a World Cup partner stunt champion four times, a back-to-back National Cheerleaders Association national partner stunt champion, two-time world champion with the United States National Team, Fédération Internationale du Sport Universitaire world champion, a back-to-back Division 1 grand collegiate national champion, 2021 Texas Cheerleader of the Year, and more.
Will Naughton, Marketing & Communications
- Contact:
Bryan Magaña, public relations director
801-626-7948, bryanmagana@weber.edu