When Esmeralda Tello-Tello was in seventh grade, she went to see her first color guard performance at Perry Meridian Middle School.

“When they performed I thought that was so cool, and I wanted to do it,” Tello-Tello said.

Her freshman year of high school, orchestra teacher Thomas Wright gave her the opportunity to be in color guard. When she was handed the sign up paper, she knew she had to get involved.

“It’s been fun since (I joined),” Tello-Tello said.

Explaining to her family that she wanted to do color guard or what it even was “was not a simple task”, Tello- Tello said. Although it was hard for them to understand what exactly she was doing, her family supported her.

“All they know is I spin a flag in the air, and that’s it,” Tello-Tello said.

According to Tello-Tello, being a part of color guard has increased her confidence. Before she joined the team, she would never dream of performing in front of an audience, but color guard has changed her for the better.

“As things went on I kind of started building confidence because of the people around me,” Tello-Tello said.

Her favorite thing about color guard is that anyone, no matter how experienced, can join the team. At tryouts, everyone is very welcoming, and that makes things more comfortable for the newcomers, says Tello-Tello.

“The people who have experience, they’re not going to make you feel like crap because they felt like that,” Tello-Tello said. “They’ve been in your shoes.”

Another thing Tello-Tello loves about being in color guard is the performances. She really enjoys it because they get to experience different emotions and they get to be rough with their equipment.

According to Tello-Tello, she wants to continue on with color guard even after she graduates from high school. Her participation in color guard has opened up a lot of extra things that she never thought she would be able to do. Now she gets to be involved at the football games by performing at the halftime shows.

The color guard assistant coach and SHS graduate of 2017, Sierra Roberts, says that Tello-Tello is like a big sister to the other team members. She will go out of her way to help her teammates, and she does extra things to benefit herself. For example, she will even work at home by looking up videos on the internet to learn different moves that the coaches don’t have time to teach.

According to Roberts, Tello-Tello is very strong and has a wonderful technique. Even though she isn’t the captain of the team this year, Roberts says that she is definitely a leader.

“She constantly strives to be better,” Roberts said.