Skateboarding is an extreme-sport that’s been popular with adolescents and young adults for decades. The activity has gained so much popularity that it has become more of a culture to skaters than just a sport.

A number of students here are self-proclaimed skaters, but there’s more than one kind of skating one can do. Another style of skating called longboarding is also very popular. A longboard is very similar to a regular skateboard, but it has a larger deck, larger wheels, a higher rise and is designed for a smoother ride, similar to surfing.

George Jezzard, junior, said he prefers longboarding to skateboarding because it has a “calmer atmosphere.” The first trick he learned on it was a cross-step.

“I just naturally veered toward it. Skateboarding is cool too, though,” Jezzard said.

Regardless of the growing number of longboarders here, skateboarding seems to remain the more popular style of skate.

Kyle Bullis, junior, said he prefers regular skating because he “likes doing actual tricks instead of just cruising.”

Dakota Plowman, sophomore, has been skating for about two to three years. With those years of practice, he’s learned a number of tricks, but the first one he learned was a pop-shuvit, a trick where the skater flips the board under his feet.

There are countless tricks one can master in both skateboarding and longboarding, some being easier than others.

Some common first-tricks a skater will learn other than a pop-shuvit will include an ollie, where the skater simply makes the board jump by stepping on the back of the board and sliding their other foot to the front and pushing down, or a kickflip, which is essentially jumping the board and spinning it 360 degrees.

“There’s no elitism in the skate community. Skating is something you can do without worrying about any rank, and something where your experience doesn’t determine your validity as a skater,” Plowman said.

Hayden Godsey, junior, seems to agree with Plowman’s statement, believing that just learning how to ride a board is a trick in itself.

Godsey is also an avid skater, having started in the seventh grade.

His favorite skate parks in the area include Two Trails, OP in Overland Park, Pierson Park in Turner, and Penn Valley in Kansas City.

While skate parks are good areas for skaters to meet other skaters and pick up a few tricks, many students prefer skating the streets to the crowded parks.

Jezzard said his favorite street to longboard on is West 167th Street. Plowman and fellow skaters, Bullis and Micah Doughty, junior, also prefer street skating to skating at parks, because of the lack of other skaters taking up room.

A lot of students have favorite pro-skaters as well. Doughty said his favorite is Gou Miagi “because his tricks are so weird and intricate.” Plowman said his favorite skater is Dylan Rieder because of the smoothness of his skating.

Other popular professionals students named were Lewis Marnell, Chris Haslam, Rodney Mullen, Mike Vallely, Richie Jackson and Jason Park.

Despite the popularity of this sport, many people tend to have a distorted view of skaters and the skate community as a whole and think they’re scary, weird or vandals.

“The fact that it’s different is what makes it awesome,” Jezzard said. “We don’t care what people think of what we do because we love it and have fun doing it.”