Spotlight New Jersey: The Committee GNO and the S.M.A.R.T. Foundation

Spotlight New Jersey: Guided Collaboration Collective

Spotlight New Jersey: It Takes a Borough 

Spotlight New Jersey: Singer/songwriter/author Genevieve

Spotlight New Jersey: Modern Mom Probs

Spotlight New Jersey: Embroidery Babes

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News 12 Staff

16spotlightNJpart2_2024-01-06-09-29-39

No stars Gymnastics Academy and Booton is celebrating 50 years. Ashley Umberger is CEO and part owner. She's also an elite gymnast herself along with Olivia Kelly, who's also an author and Alana Walker. Ladies. Oh my God, we have to talk about your skills and what you do. Let's start with a video of you. Go ahead Olivia. Um So this video is from worlds in 2023 this past worlds. Um I've been making history for Barbados by competing at Worlds. This is my second world. Um and I beat my previous score from 2022 and place so made history twice with that. Um Congratulations. Were you so pumped up when that happened? I was Flora is one of my favorite events to compete. So, um this was a very exciting moment for me and I was really just trying to stay in the moment and you know, enjoy everything about being on the world stage. Exactly. And what about you, Alana too? Do you try to stay in the moment too as we take a look at your video as well? Yeah. Uh it really helps like just to not think too far ahead and also not dwell on what had just happened. So um this is me just competing at States. I finally got to get back and compete. My two biggest passes AA L and full in. Um And it was really nice just to like, remember this floor team really like dance it and not be too focused on the next event or the one before it and just like really be in the moment. Who are the people who inspired you? Do you watch Simone Biles and others? I do. Yes. Um When I was younger though, my biggest inspiration was definitely Gabby Douglas watching her. I was little in the Olympics. Um She's on my wall in my room. I have pictures of Gabby Douglas up because she was like my biggest Gabby. Do you hear that? She's start training again? Yes, she is excited for that company. But yeah, she's definitely her and the whole entire um Olympic team in 2012 was just a big inspiration to my whole gymnastics journey. Your parents Alana are so proud of you because of something you accomplished in Jamaica. Yeah. Um So I got the chance to compete for Jamaica in 2021 in Mexico. And I at the end of the meet, I finished third and it was Jamaica's first international like having someone medal at International Elite. And um I didn't realize it in the moment. I was just like happy to be done. It was my first internat international meet we finished and then all of a sudden they took her away from me like, where are you going? Like, oh, she, she got third. It's like, oh, yeah, I was like, ok, wait, yay. And then, and then um they gave me this like Jamaican flag to wear like a from the podium. And then my parents told me after like, you're actually the first person to do this. And I was like, oh, wow, like that's amazing. How did it feel to know you were representing like that, that it was, it was crazy feeling. It was so surreal. I definitely didn't like get over that. I was like, wow, like this is amazing. Like, i it's crazy to be the first person to do something. It's, yeah, Olivia and Alana launched their own foundation to help others following in their footsteps. It's called stronger together. These elite gym to say their focus is to inspire athletes in the Caribbean where their families are from, right? We see a lot of talented athletes who have big dreams, big goals, maybe it's either compete on a collegiate level or even just be a better gymnast and they don't have um the resources really to help um inspire them to even achieve that goal or they don't see a lot of gymnasts that even achieve that goal that are like them. So, you know, we figured doing this foundation can maybe help them either be inspired or even just achieve their goals and get scholarships or even just, you know, we wanted to maybe do a camp or something, you know, just to help them be better gymnasts, better people at noon. Olivia Alana and their coach Ashley offer their advice on becoming an elite gymnast.

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16spotlightNJpart3_2024-01-06-12-21-15

My guests today are with North Stars Gymnastics Academy and Booton celebrating 50 years. Ashley Umberger is CEO and part owner and elite coach. She's also with two elite gymnasts. We have Olivia Kelly and of course, Elana Walker, ladies, let's talk some more about what it takes to get to the level of what you do. Now, I think a lot, what it has to do is the girls, number one have to love the sport, then they have to find a coach and a program that they can trust and understand. They're gonna have good days, they're gonna have bad days, they're gonna go home and they're not gonna like you some days, they're gonna go home and they're gonna love you some days and, and that's just part of the process. Um, one of our things that we say at North Stars is trust the process. If you do the work and you do the assignments, you're gonna have failures, you're gonna have successes, but ultimately, you're gonna get to what you wanna get to. And I think both of these girls have, have ultimately done that and beyond. Um, you know, with where they're going to college and you never go into a sport. Thinking, oh, I wanna go to this college. I wanna do a scholarship. It's, I wanna be the best I can be. And I think both of these girls have un undeniably become the best that they can be, um, and have deserved every gift that they have. I don't even wanna say given but every gift you've worked hard to get. Um, why don't you guys share a little bit about where you're going to next? You tell us about the college acceptance. Yes, you can go first. So I was just accepted and to stay birders. Congratulations. Continue gymnastics and academics there. Yeah, I will also continue my gymnastics and academic journey at University of Missouri and these are full scholarships, scholarships. That's impressive. Yes. Do you know what studies you wanna undertake? Um, right now I think I'm gonna go with mechanical engineering, maybe some like product design or something like that. I wish you could have heard the reaction. I have no idea. You will find your way once you get there. Exactly. You will know in your heart what you'd like to do. What advice would you like to leave to young girls who are watching? Hm. Oh, I would say, um, again, just the process. Um, if you love it, you know, you always find a way to keep going, keep pushing and they'll always be inspiration there. If you, if you're doing what you love and also, like, gymnastics isn't the end all, but it's an amazing thing to be able to be doing. Um, so just to really enjoy every moment of it however long you're doing it. Like some people go back and do it again because they love the sport so much. What does it teach you about yourself? Ashley? Um, that I'm extremely lucky that I wake up every day and I love what I do. I get to interact with different kids every day and help them achieve their goals, which is just it, it's, it's a great feeling like I said, to help others every day um and to extend their lives and to extend their goals and to know I'm kind of kick starting that off. That's the best thing I can feel as an adult to help this world. And like I said, we need more people like you guys. Thank you. Aren't they fantastic? Along with being a gymnast. Olivia is also an author. Her new book is titled Am I Too Tall For Gymnastics? Olivia wants to help inspire other young girls interested in this sport. She was so excited when her mom took her, Alana and their friends to New York City. Check it out. Her book was featured right there on a billboard in Times Square. How cool is that? Tomorrow? Ashley will talk about her experience as a gymnast.

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17spotlightnj4_2024-01-07-11-19-30

We are putting the focus on North Stars Gymnastics Academy in Booton, which is celebrating 50 years. Ashley Umberger is CEO and part owner. She is also an elite gymnast herself. How did you get started? Well, I got started at the age of four. and the first time I did a class was at international gymnastics school. Um and that's like five minutes from where I live in the Poconos. Um This is funny, international gymnastics camp is actually where I took Olivia a lot of time to train on the equipment to get ready for international assignments. So they've been a big help in helping prepare our athletes. Um from there. I basically, they, they have a camp, they aren't really a full time program. So I found North Stars in New Jersey and started commuting to New Jersey. From the time I was nine years old and spent about an hour and a half in the car commuting, um trained at the gym. I was actually homeschooled from age nine, ninth grade to 11th grade and um achieved my goal, I was training about 40 hours a week and then achieved my goal of making the national team and getting a scholarship. Um and really just started my life on how I wanted to get going. We have video of you go ahead and tell us about it. Oh my God, you're gonna date me here. So this is video. So for me from back in 2001 when that's United States U SAS, it's a qualifying meet to make United States national team national team is basically when you make that, that's the team that goes out to the Olympic trials, goes to the Olympics, goes to any international assignment that the United States decides they're gonna go to. Um So that's about 23 years ago that I said when she walked in, I said you're the coach like one of the students. Well, I think part of that is it's the energy and being around the young athletes. Um I, I truly believe that these girls are in the gym 25 to 30 hours a week. They have to want to be there. Um I'm not the one doing gymnastics anymore. I asked them to do conditioning. I asked them to do routines and there has to be an energy, there has to be a connection with these kids to understand. I get you're doing hard work, but hard work is the only way to get the result that you wanna get to. Um And these two have done some of the most hard working routines and skills and that's why they've reached the levels that they've reached to because they've sacrificed so much. You see the potential in these young ladies when they come in. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. They come in and you say, all right, you just need to take another turn and instead of taking one turn, they take five and then you're like, oh my God, that's great. I love that. And, and that's, that's the energy that we, we deal with in the gym and when they have their days when they feel like I can't do this or they keep messing up and it's not working out. What do you do to motivate them? Um, you, you, you understand where they're coming from number one because as an adult there is not as much physical activity that these girls have to do. Their bodies are the vehicle. So, in every sport, like you have, you know, driving a race car, if you wreck a race car, you know, the car gets wrecked and hopefully you're ok. These girls, if, if they land short, it's an ankle, it's a knee. So they really have to be involved and in the moment and they might have a cold or be a little under the weather when they have to do a final knee. So we always say in the gym doesn't matter if you feel great, it's actually more important that you can do it when you're ok when you're average because then you can do it when you're a little nervous coming up at nine, her elite gymnasts, Olivia Kelley and Elana Walker will talk about their stronger together foundation.

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17spotlightNJpart5_2024-01-07-11-21-43

And a lead gymnast at North Stars Gymnastics Academy in Booton celebrates two big honors. Olivia Kelly was featured on this billboard in Times Square. It recognized her performance for Team Barbados at the Worlds in Belgium in October. Olivia's mom surprised her fellow gymnast, Alana Walker and their friends with a trip to New York City to see it. Olivia also has this new book out. Am I too tall for gymnastics? She wants to help inspire other young girls interested in this sport. Olivia and Alana also launched a nonprofit called The Stronger Together Foundation. Welcome to both of you ladies. Thank you first. Let's talk about the fact you were together there in Times Square. What was that like? It was so nice. I it was really surprising. I knew I was going to the city, but my mom had surprised me and brought some of my friends along to go to the surprise and it turned out to be, you know, Times Square. So and Alana, yeah, it was with me. Yeah, none of us knew what was going on. No, we were just like, oh, we're going into the city today and just so happened like, oh, she's on a billboard and you see this big person out there? Wow. I bet that's something you'll never forget. It was really, it was really, I was grateful for it. I was, I wanna thank my mom for that. That was really nice. Moms are wonderful like that, aren't they? I love the cover of your book. What inspired that, the cover or just the whole entire whole book? Um, I would say so in COVID, I grew a lot and it was a struggle to really get all my skills back and just get back into the swing of things. So, and I know a couple more gymnasts that are going through the same thing and I wanted to just kind of shed light on how I overcame that struggle and, you know, became my best self and became my best gymnast. In other words, you shut up. Did you do the same thing a little bit? Yeah, I Yeah. Yeah, I definitely grew, we both grew quite a bit over COVID because we weren't training as much. So we had our growth spurts then which definitely made it like harder to like get back into training. Did you have to find your balance again with your body and get in tune with it? That and just like bars. Um you know, the bars are pretty close together. So, you know, you have to learn how to like stra of your legs when you're swinging or um kind of just tap in a different place now because now you have longer limbs to, to flip around. So, yeah. Yeah, you gotta adjust. But, and that's the message you want girls to take away from this book. Yes, I want to inspire them to just keep pushing. You know, that just because you grew doesn't mean that you can't do gymnastics anymore. You just gotta adjust and if you really wanna do it, you could still do it. How long did it take you to write it? Who to write it? Um, probably like a month or two but just everything, like all the details took a bit longer, like, maybe 67 months and it all came together for you. Yes. Yeah. And at noon, Olivia and Alana will talk all about their stronger together foundation.

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17spotlightNJ6_2024-01-07-12-20-51

I have two lovely ladies. They are elite gymnasts. Joining me here on spotlight New Jersey. Olivia Kelly and Alana Walker. They also launched a new nonprofit called The Stronger Together Foundation. Let's talk more about that. How did you all get that off the ground and why? Um So we started it just as a way to help um initially gymnasts in the Caribbean just because we've been traveling around a lot to international needs training in these countries too and realize that they might need a little bit of help to like achieve their dreams and goals, right? We see a lot of talented athletes who have big dreams, big goals, maybe it's either compete on the collegiate level or even just be a better gymnast and they don't have um the resources really to help um inspire them to even achieve that goal or they don't see a lot of gymnasts that even achieve that goal that are like them. So, you know, we figured doing this foundation can maybe help them either be inspired or even just achieve their goals and get scholarships or even just, you know, we wanted to maybe do a camp or something, you know, just to help them be better, gymnast, better people. What is the mission? How would you define it? Mission? I'd say it's to um extend like our outreach to different um countries in the Caribbean, help them um grow their knowledge about gymnastics and even other sports eventually. And just to help them with all the resources that they need to be able to um achieve their big dreams. And why do you want to help the Caribbean so much? Um We are from the Caribbean. So our, our families are from the Caribbean and we spend a lot of time there and just, I feel that seeing and meeting either people from other Caribbean countries uh at these international meets, I just see how much um how much they love gymnastics or even just sports in general. Um the community in all of these countries. You see a lot of talent. Yeah, definitely a lot of talent in all ages, social media even too. You can see it on social media or even just when you go, you just see all these kids that love their sport. What do they say to you when they meet you? Knowing that you two are elite gymnast, frequently asked question I would say is um how do you, how do you do that? Yeah, you're like, that's so like, that's so cool. Like, how are you up? So high stuff like that? Yeah. Yeah. A lot of um technical questions or like specific questions like, oh, how did you do that skill or you just like things you know that they're curious about or how does it feel to be on a big stage? Just like, and got a lot of like, I wanna be able to do that, like, like, oh, I wish I could be up there. Like those kind of Olivia penned this new book called Am I Too Tall For Gymnastics? She says some of the proceeds will go towards the Stronger Together Foundation.

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News 12’s Della Crews spoke to CEO and part-owner Ashley Umberger about the milestone.

Spotlight New Jersey: North Stars Gymnastics Academy in Boonton celebrates 50th anniversary

News 12’s Della Crews spoke to CEO and part-owner Ashley Umberger about the milestone.

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