Sami Jo Crawford signs with Buena Vista

Yet another Mt. Pleasant cheerleader will be cheering at the next level. On Monday, Sami Jo Crawford, a senior cheerleader for the Panthers, signed her letter of intent to attend and cheer at Buena Vista University in Storm Lake.

Crawford says she chose Buena Vista after seeing their campus and meeting their cheer coach.

'It was the start of the summer and I had no idea,” Crawford said. 'I knew I wanted to go into psychology, but I had no idea where I wanted to go, and one of my friends was like, ‘You should look at Buena Vista. It's such a beautiful campus.' We went on our visit and I just fell in love with the campus.”

Crawford says meeting their coach helped calm her nerves about the idea of cheering at the collegiate level.

'I've always wanted to be a cheelearder,” says Crawford. 'But when I got into high school, I never thought I'd be able to, because I can't tumble, and recently I got a back injury, and was like, ‘I'm never going to be able to do it at the college level.' I showed her my stuff and she was like, ‘You can still do it. We believe in you (and) we want you.'”

Crawford will be studying both Criminal Justice and Psychology at Buena Vista. She says she would like to go in to criminal profiling.

Crawford says cheering at the next level is 'like a childhood dream” of hers. She is one of many cheerleaders who move on to cheer in college from Mt. Pleasant, and she says the team's family atmosphere is a big reason why.

'It's such a big family,” she said. 'We are all just so supportive of each other, and Nikole (Keaster) is such an amazing coach, and she believes in everyone. She made me believe in myself when I never thought I'd be able to.”