Majestic Officer and Sergeant tryout results have been announced, however the specific positions awarded will not be released until the final night of Majestic Spring Show on April 26. Unlike the already difficult drill team tryouts, officer tryouts are much longer, and much more in-depth.

“We do a very detailed tryout because we expect a lot from our officers once they earn a position,” Majestics Director Fela Lowrance said. “Officers help with choreography and the management process so we expect them to step into a very high role of leadership, so I think it’s important for the girls to go through a demanding tryout in order to have an understanding on a beginning level of what they’re going to have to do as officers.”

Becoming an officer is extremely an grueling process.

“We had to make a binder with our essay explaining why we wanted to be an officer,” junior Lexi Seay said. “We also had to make a PowerPoint over the book that we read on leadership, we had to get letters of recommendation, our transcript, our resume, and then we had to make a duet with a partner and a style of dance that we drew, we showed and taught it to the team, showed it to the judges, and then we had to learn the officer strut that you see on the football field and another dance that we had to learn in two days. On top of all of that we had an interview in front of the team.”

The entire process is outlined to make sure that the selected officers for the team can lead their peers effectively while and also helping them prepare for the future.

“It’s not just about the officer tryout itself,” Lowrance said. “It’s about growing as an individual, making sure you’re ready for that kind of responsibility and having a taste of the things that you’ll do later in life.”

This year, everyone who tried out for a leadership position was appointed one.

“I think there will just be a lot of lieutenants this year,” Seay said. “They all really deserved it.”

Tryouts were even more detailed this year than they were for the previous officers.

“It was a little more stressful on the sergeants this year than last year,” senior and Master Sergeant Jayme Allen said. “This year the entire leadership team is a whole new batch, none of them have ever had positions before, so for both dance officers and sergeants there was a lot more of getting to know the girls and their leadership styles, so that was another added pressure onto them. They had to show who they were as a leader in a really short amount of time.”

While dances for the tryout are learned in a short amount of time, some facets of the audition girls couldn’t prepare for.

“Having to talk to the team and answering the team questions was the hardest part,” junior Payton Welch said. “It’s so nerve wracking. It’s on the spot questions, you don’t know what you’re going to be asked.”

For some girls, this extremely selective process was worth it.

“I wanted to be more involved in the team,” junior Tori Orten said. “I wanted to be a bigger part of it.”

Though dancers were trying out for their own positions, the team ethic was still strong through competition with one another.

“I was really excited when I heard I had a position,” Seay said. “I had opened mine and I made Courtney (Reed) open hers, and I was more excited when I heard that she made it than I did when I opened mine.”

The current leaders of the drill team serve as inspiration to their younger team members as being a Majestic leader is something many of the dancers aspire to.

“My baby year [First year as a Majestic] I think I really looked up to the officers and thought maybe I’d get one of their spots later,” senior and Major Abby Hughey said. “I never thought I’d get it; I hoped for it. I just remember really looking up to them and really wanted to be a role model, and I could see myself maybe doing that.”

Though all who tried out were appointed leadership positions, this has not been the case in previous years, nor was it expected.

“Trying out was so rigorous,” Hughey said. “It was kind of crazy to me to go through so much that we did to maybe not get it, but we were willing to go through all of that work to just audition. It was a lot of learning about yourself, I always thought I was a shy person but through the process I realized I could be a lot more confident when I was talking about how I wanted a leadership role, and what kind of a leader I could be the next year.”

For all of the dancers who tried out, the tryout process does not stop here. The pressure is continuous for the whole year.

“As an officer this is the kind of stress you’re under,” senior and Majestic Captain Katie Egger said. “You don’t have the stress for one week, it’s for the whole year and you have to be able to cope with it. Being an officer is an honor, and it’s not going to be easy. You’re going to have to work harder than you ever have for it.”