The ever-popular Rah! Rah! Sis! Boom! Bah! was heard for the first time almost 150 years ago at a Princeton University football game. The "yell leaders" were all male.

Flash forward to 2013 and the cheerleaders of Spotlight Studios North Star in Hayden.

"I love the competitive part," said Tori Chavez, a Spotlight athlete. "It's the biggest team sport I've been on. We want to be seen as a sport, not just cheering for others."

Spotlight is not your old-fashioned cheerleading emporium. It is, rather, part of a huge national movement known as "All Star Cheerleading." The International Cheer Union estimates 1.5 million athletes participate in All Star.

Unlike its more traditional sister - high school sideline cheering - All Star is about competition, pure and simple. Competitions are conducted at regional, national and international levels with the opposition being other All Star teams.

Stacy Steinwandel is the owner and skills coach of Spotlight.

"I do this because I love working withchildren," she said.

"We were recently regional/national and international champions and were selected to compete at The Summit, where we placed as top-five national finalists."

Two Spotlight teams were invited to perform their two-minute thirty-second routines at The Summit - the crowning jewel of All Star competitions. The Hayden teams received a bid to compete there because they'd previously scored in the top 10 percent of the nation.

"In our competitive routines, we do tumbling, stunting, dancing, but no cheering," Steinwandel said. "Our music is professionally done cheer music that is worked in with the choreography of the routine."

The energy in the air at Spotlight is almost palpable. The athletes clearly love their sport.

"I did join a high school team, but I missed the competition," said Elizabeth Damiano, whose mother, Leslie, was once a cheerleader for Coeur d'Alene High School. "Sideline is a lot of fun, but it's not as challenging (as All Star)."

Steinwandel said that 40 percent of her gym participates in both All Star and high school cheerleading.

Admittedly All Star may be great fun, but it can also be a ticket to a lucrative college scholarship, with schools in Texas, the South and the East Coast offering the bulk of this money.

"Colleges look for athletes with excellent levels of skill, such as tumbling and group/partner stunting," Steinwandel said. "They also want to see a history of competitive experience and titles in the athlete's past."

Hailee Duvall, 11, is what's known as a "flyer" in cheerleading circles. She's the one balancing at the top of all the action.

"Everything that's new can be scary at first," said the confident preteen. "But when you're doing your routine at a competition, the time goes by super fast."

Robin Duvall, Hailee's mother, said her daughter virtually lives at the gym, always coming after school to practice. "The first time she saw the cheerleaders in the Fourth of July parade, she said to me, 'That's what I want to do.'"

Spotlight trains competitive cheerleaders from early childhood up through late teens. There is, Steinwandel said, a place for everyone.

"Every level and every age bracket competes," she said. "We've won national titles from level one through level six."

Each team meets one day a week for a two to three hour class. Often, like Hailee Duvall, the athletes return and practice on their own for up to 20 hours a week. The more advanced ones help coach the younger ones.

It's challenging, confidence-building and offers participants the opportunity to travel and win scholarships. But All Star is also about comaraderie and being surrounded by friends. It's not just a sport, it's a lifestyle.

According to Phil Damiano, Elizabeth Damiano's father, "Once you are locked into the cheer thing, it's like a rubber band. Once a cheerleader, always a cheerleader."