Category: News

The NYJTL Mayor Dinkins Cup Launches in 2022

Posted on by Sadia Saba

The Mayor Dinkins Cup is the largest free junior interscholastic tennis competition in the nation, with players from all over New York City representing public, parochial, and private schools. Formerly the Mayor’s Cup, New York Junior Tennis & Learning (NYJTL) renamed the tournament the Mayor Dinkins Cup to honor David N. Dinkins, NYC’s first Black Mayor and NYJTL Board Member for 35 years. This year’s Mayor Dinkins Cup will be held at The Cary Leeds Center for Tennis & Learning from May 26 to June 5.

“Renaming the NYJTL Mayor’s Cup in honor of Mayor David N. Dinkins is extra special for our organization as the late Mayor was actively involved in our grassroots efforts, whether it be this championship or at our annual National Essay Contest, throughout his long-standing tenure on our board,” says Udai Tambar, NYJTL CEO & President. “His devotion to the service of NYC children and tennis was evident to all that encountered him and I am happy that his life-long passions will continue to be championed through our work.  Now every NYC youth will have the opportunity to play in this tournament bearing his name.”

History of Mayor Dinkins Cup

Mayor Dinkins had a longstanding connection with tennis, and a cornerstone of his identity as a public servant was his dedication to diversifying the sport. As an NYJTL Board Member, he championed its work to develop the character of youth through tennis and education free of charge to New York City’s most vulnerable populations. He was a close friend of NYJTL founder Arthur Ashe, and in 1990 wrote in The New York Times:“These programs teach our young people more than just tennis. They reinforce values such as discipline, courteousness, good sportsmanship, team spirit and responsibility. And because many of these programs are held within our schools, they teach our children the importance of a good education and encourage them to stay in school.”  In his tenure as the first African-American mayor of the city, he negotiated the deal to create Arthur Ashe Stadium and helped ensure that NYC remained the host of the US Open, cementing the legacy of Ashe and ensuring that this global event stayed in the city. 

Working closely with the Public School Athletic League (PSAL), Catholic High School Athletic Association (CHSAA), local private school coaches, and tennis supporters, NYJTL formed a tournament committee which created the unique format of team and individual events in both singles and doubles competitions. With the support of so many, the formerly named NYJTL Mayor’s Cup became a reality in 1988 and has continued to engage the community ever since.

The NYJTL Mayor Dinkins Cup has offered both individual and team competitions for more than 800 elementary, middle, and high school students. Similar to the NCAA Championships, students of all levels have the opportunity to represent their school as well as to compete in individual events.

NYJTL Scholarships

NYJTL’s vision is to enable youth to grow with the game and it is proud to recognize outstanding youth who excel in tennis, academics, and character. Through the newly established Louis Marx, Jr. Educational Scholarship, Victor Kiam “Going For It” Scholarship, and AYS Leadership & Innovation Scholarship, NYJTL is able to recognize exceptional achievement and award college scholarships to outstanding students. NYJTL scholarships will be awarded June 5 at 2 pm at the closing ceremony.

For more information. please visit nyjtl.org/mayor-dinkins-cup/ or contact Tournament Director Michele Cope at mayordinkinscup@nyjtl.org

The Power of Tennis: Joshuah Gyebi and Dylan Chervony

Posted on by Sadia Saba

Tennis has the power to change lives, and the unique influence of this sport can be seen in the stories of Joshuah Gyebi, 18, and Dylan Chervony, 15. Joshuah and Dylan were both students at Icahn Charter School 2, located in the Bronx, where they participated in the NYJTL ACES Afterschool Program throughout middle school. Now, the two are ACES graduates and have made it into their high school varsity and junior varsity tennis teams at the prestigious Fordham Preparatory School.

Though at the time the ACES program was new at their school, Joshuah and Dylan quickly became active in the program. Joshuah resonated the most with tennis amongst his peers. Victor Ayudant, his coach and the Recreational Coordinator for ACES, saw the potential and drive in him. Because of this, he would take Joshuah to play every weekend at the nearby Cary Leeds Center for Tennis & Learning.  Joshuah recalls that he would lose terribly at every one of these matches, but that did not deter him. The greatest lesson he has learned from the experience was the importance of perseverance. “You need to be there for the highs and lows,” Joshuah says. Eventually, Joshuah sharpened his skills and became captain of Icahn 2’s ACES tennis team for three years in a row. Similarly, Dylan’s love for tennis started when he began at ACES. Previously having played basketball, he said “tennis gave me a very different feeling.” Dylan loved the unique skills he was learning in the sport. After some time he, too, became captain of the ACES team. Joshuah and Dylan competed in several NYJTL tournaments such as the President’s Cup, ACEster Cup, and the Mayors’ Cup, now known as the Mayor Dinkins Cup.

Joshuah and Dylan are not the only two individuals who benefited from Victor’s passion for helping young people reach their full potential. To create a sense of community and promote play, Victor brings students from Icahn 2, where he first started as a coach, to play tennis at the Cary Leeds Center on weekends. They practice drills, play matches, and sharpen their skills all while having fun on the court. Joshuah and Dylan were once those children that Victor would bring, but now they help lead the sessions and mentor the young students from Icahn 2. “I want to teach them about leadership. By helping me coach, they learn how to lead by example,” says Victor.  

Tennis had an impact on both their lives beyond the tennis court, and played a pivotal role in both their personal growth. “I strived to do better in school just so I could join Coach Victor and play tennis,” Dylan remembers. “I’m hard on my kids. They know that the only way they could have fun with me on the court is if they are doing well in school. Tennis and education go hand in hand,” says Victor. For Joshuah, the most important life skill he learned was discipline. Tennis taught him to understand his strengths, analyze his weaknesses, and do the same to his opponent. This taught him about self-reflection, and he found himself bringing this to other areas of his life such as school. “It helps me explore how I am doing well and how I can improve,” Joshuah says. The many years of playing tennis in ACES taught the boys much about sportsmanship, perseverance, and the ability to deal with adversity- both on and off the court. 

The mentorship and positive role models that NYJTL provided them throughout middle school were deeply influential in their success in tennis and in their own personal lives. Now, Dylan and Joshuah are ecstatic to be playing for their high school varsity tennis teams, and are still volunteers for NYJTL programs such as Serve and Connect with NYPD at the Cary Leeds Center. The boys are planning on attending college, and hope to continue to play tennis in their universities and beyond.  

NYJTL Professional Tennis Tournament Leads Into US Open

Posted on by Sadia Saba

New York Junior Tennis & Learning (NYJTL) is excited to welcome back the NYJTL Bronx Open from August 14-21, 2022 at the world-class Cary Leeds Center for Tennis & Learning in the south Bronx. This year’s event is a women’s $60,000 USTA Pro-Circuit Tournament during the week leading into the US Open Qualifying tournament. This event continues a long history of hosting professional tennis tournaments throughout NYJTL’s 50 years of service. It is one of the longest standing tournaments held at one location in the United States. The NYJTL Bronx Open will feature a main draw with 32 singles players plus a 16-team doubles’ event and a 32-player qualifying event. In addition, the Cary Leeds Center will serve as a practice court facility for the US Open and will host the US Open Junior Qualifying tournament.

Bringing the Community Together

“We are elated to experience what NYJTL is investing into our community,” says Bronx Borough President Vanessa L. Gibson. “Bringing premier events to the Bronx has been incredibly impactful, and I am grateful to NYJTL for empowering the next generation of future tennis stars to get out and play at the beautiful Cary Leeds Center.”

Since its inception when the tournament was played on the public courts in Crotona Park, the NYJTL Bronx Open has admitted spectators at no charge to encourage attendance by youth and adults from throughout the community. It provides the opportunity for NYC youth to view professional tennis in a way that may not have otherwise been accessible. NYJTL is committed to providing community-based events for children in need, and ensuring that they are a part of this aspirational tournament.

“We are thrilled to welcome women’s professional tennis back to the Bronx and celebrate the sport that has proven to change lives,” says NYJTL President & CEO Udai Tambar. “As Arthur Ashe once said, the game teaches our children about ‘matters more important than tennis’. It is crucial for young people to see our values of healthy living, character, and teamwork actualized. The competitors are invaluable role models that display the importance of perseverance, and teach our children that they can dream bigger and achieve their goals.”

Sponsorships

This year the NYJTL Bronx Open will take place at the Cary Leeds Center for the second time. With access to 20 tennis courts and two additional stadium courts with permanent seating for more than 800 spectators, the Victor Kiam Stadium and the Pershing Square Stadium offer a courtside view of the world to the community, creating an unmatched up-close and intimate tennis viewing experience.

NYJTL is actively recruiting more like-minded partners and sponsors that look to serve the community and reach a broad audience during this key window of media exposure. The 2019 Bronx Open gained coverage on the local, national, and international level and had more than 60,000 unique visitors view its website. This world class event garnered attention from The New York Times, The Washington Post, Tennis.com, NY1, and other notable press outlets.

Sponsorship of the NYJTL Bronx Open offers unique benefits to corporate marketers whose advertising strategies align with the strong, global demographics of women’s tennis which is the undisputed global leader in women’s sport.  Sponsorship presents the following marketing benefits and opportunities:

  • Print and Digital Media
  • Social Media
  • Promotional Activities
  • On-Site Signage & Benefits
  • Entertainment
  • Charitable Activities
  • Broadcast Potential

If you are interested in leveraging this event for good, please contact Tournament Director, Joe Ceriello at jceriello@nyjtl.org

About NYJTL:

The mission of New York Junior Tennis & Learning is to develop the character of young people through tennis and education for a lifetime of success on and off the court.  Since 1971, NYJTL has changed lives through tennis, education, healthy living, and character development programs.  Today, it is the largest youth tennis and education non-profit in the nation, reaching more than 85,000 K-12 New York City youth.

NYJTL provides after school programming in approximately 30 schools and community tennis programming at approximately 40 sites throughout New York City in the summer months and at additional sites that operate during the school year.  In addition, NYJTL designed, funded (with NYC), built and operates the Cary Leeds Center for Tennis & Learning, at which it provides free and commercial tennis programming year-round as well as life skills, character development and healthy living lessons.  All NYJTL community tennis and after school programs are offered at no cost to its participants.

NYJTL is looking forward to celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2022!

Contact: Joe Ceriello
Chief Marketing & Development Officer
jceriello@nyjtl.org
(917) 693-6672

District 9 Brings Tennis to Bronx Schools

Posted on by Sadia Saba

On March 22, 2022 the Cary Leeds Center for Tennis & Learning hosted administrators from over 50 schools in New York City Community School District 9 to discuss the opportunity to provide tennis instructional programming to their students. This joins a breadth of community outreach initiatives to bring resources and access to meet the diverse needs of families in the south Bronx. School District 9 contains one of the largest public housing units in the Bronx. Though tennis has historically been viewed as a space for predominantly wealthy members of society, this collaboration with District 9 aims to bridge the gap in the sport and bring equity and opportunity to youth in need.

“This is a very powerful partnership with NYJTL,” says Community School District 9 Superintendent Harry Sherman. “NYJTL is providing our students with access to a beautiful sport that they otherwise might not have had the opportunity to experience. This access is a crucial component to equity, and we are so excited that professional tennis instruction and resources will be brought to our students.”

Principals were able to participate in dynamic warmups and on-court time to give them a glimpse into what their students will experience. NYJTL’s certified coaches will train school staff on how to teach the fundamentals of tennis in school, and will provide instructional drills and games to use during physical education time. The impact of tennis on youth goes far beyond the court. Bringing tennis into schools provides physiological and social emotional exposure to children, which is essential particularly as young people in the city slowly return from sedentary lifestyles brought about by the pandemic.

A Day in the Life at the Cary Leeds Center

Posted on by Sadia Saba

Since opening its doors in 2015, the Cary Leeds Center for Tennis & Learning has become a hub to meet the diverse needs of the community and continues to bring resources to the poorest Congressional district in the nation. Working in collaboration with civic, cultural, recreational and educational partners, NYJTL has transformed the South Bronx, delivering on the vision that tennis, academics, and character change lives. The Cary Leeds Center provides free year-round instruction and play for youth ages 5-18, from beginners to nationally-ranked junior players. With access to classroom space and study centers, teachers also offer young people a quiet and safe place to benefit from a wide variety of educational programs.  

On February 22, a day off for many public and private schools, the vision for the center could be seen actualized. Bustling with energy as kids across all ages flowed through the space, the Cary Leeds Center brought the NYJTL family together through different events and programs: 

  • Community Tennis Program President’s Week Tournament: In the morning this tournament, which has taken place annually for 10+ years, brought more than 100 children to the Cary Leeds Center. Over the course of three days, participants played in doubles pairings and competed to win the tournament. This event encourages the kids to stay active and engaged even when they are out of school during Mid-Winter Recess.  

  • President’s Week Mini Camp:Also in the morning, children from the commercial tennis programs spent time on & off court training. The week-long Mini Camp takes place throughout the year doing planned school breaks, where a team of world-class coaches encourage participants to have fun, train hard, and improve their game. 

 

  • ACES President’s Cup: Later that day, students from fourteen ACES Afterschool sites competed to win the President’s Cup which also took place during three days of Mid-Winter Recess when students are out of school. The tournament had three different competitions which were the tennis championship, the fast serve competition, and the fitness challenge. Following this was an awards ceremony where winners were announced, and everyone’s participation was celebrated. 

  • ACES Learning Cohort Session: To end the busy day, Site Directors that lead the ACES Afterschool programs gathered in the Disney Creative Learning Center classrooms for a professional development session that taught how to effectively be a program manager. Here, they learned the roles and responsibilities of being an afterschool program director, how to maintain proper time management, and how to strategically set goals.  

This gives you a glimpse of the important work taking place every day at NYJTL’s flagship home in the Bronx.

Serve & Connect is Underway

Posted on by Sadia Saba

On February 12, the Cary Leeds Center for Tennis & Learning kicked off Serve & Connect, a community engagement program designed to bring youth and uniformed police together in a fun, physical environment to promote informal mentoring, relationship building, and the delivery of a life skills curriculum. After a two-year hiatus due to the pandemic, the program brought together officers from the 42nd Precinct and youth from the community to participate in activities on and off the tennis court.  

Serve & Connect serves youth from communities in the Bronx, many of whom are from the Phipps and Murphy local housing development projects, and supports the initiation of positive relations with the police. The nine-week program takes place on Saturdays from 3-5 PM, which begins with time playing tennis on the court while the officers are in plain clothes, followed by life skills mentoring in the classroom with uniformed officers. Most of the young participants are shocked when they discover that the adults they were enjoying playing on the court with were police officers all along. One of NYJTL’s core values is commitment to community, which includes a dedication to service, diversity, and inclusion. Now more than ever, relations between police officers and community members, especially those of color, are often characterized by hostility and mistrust. The unique Serve & Connect program initiates relationships between young people and the NYPD through positive interactions, mentorship, and trust.  

NYJTL’s very own Recreational Coordinator of ACES, Victor Ayudant, embodies the organization’s commitment to community and character in his volunteerism to the program.  Victor has been a part of NYJTL for eight years, first starting out as a Group Leader at Icahn 2 Charter School. Since the launch of Serve & Connect five years ago, Victor has been volunteering to help lead the program. He was drawn to it because of how officers are able to help the community through tennis. As a longtime member of the NYJTL team, Victor has always been characterized by his passion to serve.Thank you to Victor, Coaches Marilyn and Michael from the Cary Leeds Center, and the youth coordinator officers from the 42nd Precinct for engaging with our young people and building skillsets that will serve them for a lifetime!