CAPE GIRARDEAU, Mo. – Southeast Missouri women's gymnastics head coach Ashley Lawson announced Wednesday the addition of sophomore Heidi Vanderboom to its 2021 roster. Vanderboom joins the Redhawks after helping #47-ranked Temple capture the 2020 Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) Championship with a National Qualifying Score (NQS) of 194.520. 
 
A Loganville, Georgia native, Vanderboom competed in six meets for the Owls in her inaugural collegiate season. She posted career-bests of 9.750 on vault and a 9.575 on beam while assisting Temple in rewriting their program record book. 
 
Vanderboom was a member of the vault lineup that broke Temple's program record (49.15), notching a 9.700 on March 1 at Maryland with Penn, William & Mary and Yale. She also helped the Owls score their third highest overall team score (195.575) in program history against Ursinus a week later on March 8, chipping in a vault of 9.725. 
 
In the classroom, she was named a Women's Collegiate Gymnastics Association (WCGA) Academic All-American in 2020. 

"Heidi comes to SEMO with a year of collegiate competition under her belt, as a member of the Temple University gymnastics team," Lawson said of Vanderboom. "We will look for her to make instant impacts in our vault and beam lineups, as well as contributing on floor and bars. We are excited for Heidi to be joining our program and look for her to do big things as a Redhawk."
 
The daughter of Rachel Rowell and Jerry Vanderboom, Heidi Vanderboom, trained at the Georgia Gymnastics Academy with current Redhawk Jordan Jones. Heidi Vanderboom captained the team as a senior and qualified for Junior Olympic (JO) Nationals as a junior and JO Eastern Nationals as a freshman.
 
She was coached by Judy Prestigiacomo, Mandy Cain, Annette Kaiser and Sam Welbourn at Georgia Gymnastics Academy.
 
Vanderboom graduated in the top five percent of her 2019 graduating class at Loganville High School and garnered the distinction of high honors. She also was a member of the Beta Club and the National Honor Society.
 
Vanderboom will major in Industrial & Systems Engineering at SEMO.