Nancy Ellen Elster, who was a competitive cheerleader in high school, has always been passionate about cheerleading. But it wasn’t until she saw her son play at his first high school football game that she stepped into the role of head coach for Ballard High School’s cheer program.

That was the day the cheer program shifted course.

The program was in a “moribund state” according to Elster’s biography on the BHS website. It was mostly run by the students themselves, who tried — and did not succeed so well — to throw it together themselves, she said.

“I thought, ‘I’m not going to watch this while my kids play football!’” Elster recalled in a phone interview.

Last month, after 15 years of coaching at BHS, Elster was inducted into the Washington State Cheer Coach Association’s Hall of Fame 2012. It’s an honor only given to two people a year, and one which requires a long time in the business and a lot of hard work and recognition.

Throughout her time at BHS, Elster has led her cheerleaders to win awards, state championships and compete nationally. She herself won the State Coach of the Year award in 2006 and the Cheer Ltd Pinnacle National Coaching Award for Coaching Excellence in 2009.

The position is voluntary, Elster said. Even after 15 years and single-handedly transforming the program, any money she receives is basically gas money, she said.

Instead, she does the job for the kids. She enjoys watching the transformation her cheerleaders have from when they first start to when they finish the program, she said.

She said she recently received a letter from one of her alumni. The letter said, Elster recalled, “I probably wouldn’t have gone to college if it hadn’t been for you.”

“That’s huge,” Elster said.