On October 8th, Selma High’s MCJROTC program held its Selma Bear Challenge for its third year on SHS campus. It’s a series of events and games happening simultaneously, from morning to noon, that cadets from not only Selma High participate in but also compete against other cadets from other schools and their respective JROTC programs across the Central Valley. These include: Fresno High, McLane High, Hanford West, Dinuba High, and Duncan High.
Alongside the Selma Bear Challenge, the SHS JROTC program held more events for its cadets to attend this month. On October 13th, cadets went to San Francisco to tour both UC Berkeley and the USS Hornet aircraft carrier.
“It was a fun and interesting experience, we got to learn the history of soldiers at sea and got the opportunity to learn more about one of the most prominent colleges in California,” said Cadet First Lieutenant Gallardo.
The Bear Challenge is one of the events and it’s a team-based obstacle course. Following a team format of four girls cadets and four boys, the team completes tasks: such as carrying ammo cans; flipping a large tire; working with machine balls; climbing a six-foot wall; and memorization. Each team is given points on how well they complete each task and as a team. Overall, Selma High scored the second highest number of points with Fresno High taking first.
“Although I had noticeable bruises from climbing the wall, it was fun,” said Cadet Gunnery Sergeant Cortez.
Cornhole was another event played. Throwing bean bags at an elevated platform with a hole, one of the Selma teams earned first place in number of points.
“Cornhole is fun but has nothing to do with corn,” said Staff Sergeant Duarte.
Bracketology was an event also played at Selma Bear Challenge. Equivalent to the colorguard, four cadets hold separate roles but judge together as a team. One cadet is expected to have memorized several series of command sheets beforehand with one of those command sheets being randomly picked at the event. Following these commands, the team is given points on how well they keep bearing (in other words, not smiling and keeping a professional appearance), execution, and their synchronization. Fresno earned the most points then McLane and Selma respectively.
Biathlon is an event played where four cadets inexperienced in marksmanship lead by a range officer who is experienced and plays as a marksmanship team. Running around the CTE building to increase their breathing, the cadets have to then control their composure and shoot eight shots in three different positions: laying down, kneeing, and standing. This year’s winner was Duncun whose JROTC program doesn’t have marksmanship and learned that morning.
Finally, Cap the “T” was another event played. Very similar to the online game “Snake.io”, any cadet that knows basic drill shouts commands to a group of their fellow cadets (8-10) in order for the other team to bump into them. The JROTC teams from Fresno High and Dinuba forfeited.
“The Selma Bear Challenge is so tuff and motivating,” said Cadet Second Lieutenant Valle.
This year’s Selma Bear challenge brought together many JROTC programs across the Central Valley and was a day of both fun and friendly competition.
