Jasmine and Hailey Shryock are arguably the busiest students who attend Sahuaro High School. Between dance practice, karate, and magic shows, how in the world do these two sisters find enough hours in the day to get everything done?
Jasmine and Hailey have both been dancing since they were two and a half and have been in karate since they were four. As a result of having parents who are magicians, Jasmine has played the role of assistant to her father since she was nine months old, and performing her own magic act that she came up with in 3rd grade. Hailey often assists her parents in magic shows as well. The two often travel to perform in magic shows. “Pretty much anytime we go anywhere it’s not for vacation, it’s to do a show,” Jasmine remarks. One of Sahuaro’s English teachers, Ms. Lange, recently attended a magic show and she only had good things to say. “I absolutely adore those two sisters,” she gushed. “They are not only super smart with an amazing work ethic, but they are so well versed. From knowing self-defense to entertaining to dance, they do everything. Outside of that, they are the sweetest girls. I think their parents did a wonderful job of raising them and I’m glad to know them.”
Hailey is a sophomore and is a part of the marching and concert bands. Her schedule is jam-packed: she dances 12 hours a week, has marching band rehearsal on Mondays from 3:30-5:30, has flute lessons on Sundays, and does karate on Wednesdays with Jasmine before dance. When asked how she manages everything on her plate, Hailey simply remarked, “You can’t procrastinate. You just have to get it done.”
One of their favorite extracurriculars is karate even though it’s the one they spend the least amount of time doing. Hailey is a junior 3rd-degree black belt, which means she has 3 black belts. Jasmine is an adult first-degree black belt and is getting her second in October, which will put her at five black belts. Additionally, every Friday night is poker night in the Shryock household. Although Hailey doesn’t play, Jasmine has been playing since she was 7 and she believes that she has one of the best poker faces ever.
Jasmine is a senior and her schedule is also unbelievably full. She’s taking 3 AP classes this year – physics, calculus, and English literature. She is dancing 8-12 hours a week and currently has Fridays off, but she is interested in helping out with the younger kids. Jasmine is also in theater at school and they just started auditions for their winter play called The Bling Collections. “I don’t know how I balance the workload,” Jasmine said. “It’s just something I’ve done my whole life, so if I weren’t doing all these things then I don’t know what I’d be doing.”
Both sisters have big plans after high school. Jasmine has already been accepted into the University of Arizona but has not yet committed to a school. She plans on majoring in chemical engineering with a minor in theater arts, while also assisting Valerie Spell, a magician and longtime family friend. Hailey plans on going to the University of Arizona and she wants to double major in education and creative writing with the goal of being either a teacher or an author.
They both plan on dancing after high school for fun, but dance has not been easy for either of them. It is very common that they have to dance through their injuries. Both are injured right now; Hailey twisted her ankle and Jasmine has shin splints. “My shin splints are so bad that I find it extremely difficult to even walk across campus,” Jasmine explains. “If it were up to me, I’d take a week or two off from dance so that I can just heal. But there’s a lot of pressure to dance through the pain because you’ll fall behind if you don’t.”
People at dance refer to Jasmine as the “broken one” because she is almost always injured. She was born with a muscle disorder called hypotonia, which basically means that her muscles don’t do their job properly and her joints have to kind of take over for them. Jasmine’s family suspects that that is the reason she gets injured so easily. Even though it hurts to dance through an injury, Jasmine thinks it’s worth it. She expanded on it saying, “I love performing on stage because it brings the audience joy. That’s my number one goal. I don’t care about being the best, I don’t need everyone to like me, but when I get up on stage I just want to bring the audience joy and have them feel happy that they came and watched my show. So for me, dancing even when it hurts is ultimately worth it in the end.”
The sisters both agree that participating in these extracurriculars makes them closer than a lot of other siblings. Jasmine said, “Hailey was the only one there for me when no one else was.” Hailey said, “For every single essay that I’ve ever been asked to write about someone I look up to, I’ve always written about Jasmine.”
To wrap up their interview, the sisters had wise words of advice. Jasmine’s were, “Don’t stop doing what you love just because someone is making fun of you for it.” And Hailey’s were, “You don’t have to be the best at everything because you’re going to be special no matter what.”
