How Toy Cars Are Transforming Kids' Lives

On the Move

UCF’s Go Baby Go! improves outcomes for children with mobility challenges through ingenuity, resourcefulness and community.

A stoplight with a baby icon on the "Go" green light.

When you need to find UCF Clinical Associate Professor of Physical Therapy Jennifer Tucker ’23PhD, chances are she’s sitting cross-legged on a vinyl floor, tinkering with a child’s electric car in the College of Health Professions and Sciences Rehabilitation Innovation Center.

Or giving her cellphone number to parents of children with mobility challenges, encouraging them to call with questions or text photos of their kids driving their customized cars around their neighborhoods.

Or organizing dozens of volunteers — ranging from elementary schoolers to college students training to become future physical therapists, educators and engineers — in one of her many hands-on Go Baby Go! workshops throughout the year.

A national, community-based research, design and outreach program, Go Baby Go! provides accessible and inexpensive solutions for kids and adults with limited mobility at no cost to their families.

True to the name of Go Baby Go!, Tucker hasn’t stopped for a moment since introducing the program at UCF a decade ago. More than 200 cars and happily cruising kids later, Tucker and her team are gaining speed.

Child with blue bows in pigtails in her hair sits in child-sized white car decorated with Bluey on hood and the name Lucy in purple letters on black windshield. She is propped up with pink car seat insert and straps and purple kick board behind her back. Three adult women kneel down next to the car.

A traffic cone with stickers

The origin of UCF’s Go Baby Go! begins in Spring 2015, roughly 900 miles north of the university’s main campus, at the ��ֱ�� of Delaware. At the time, Tucker was six years into her teaching tenure at UCF. She says, while she loved shaping the next generation of pediatric physical therapists, she missed daily interactions with patients and impacting them as a clinician.

As she searched for a solution to fill that passion, she discovered the ��ֱ�� of Delaware’s Go Baby Go! — the first iteration of the program founded by Cole Galloway. His idea explored promoting mobility through play by modifying electric riding cars through household items including pool noodles, swimming kickboards, PVC pipe and industrial-strength Velcro to fit a child’s needs.

“We know when we look at children, from the minute they can figure out their arms and legs move, play is how they learn,” Tucker says. “Children [who] have motor impairments … don’t get the opportunity to have some of that cause and effect because they stay where they’re put. They don’t get to see, ‘If I do this, then this happens.’ And it diminishes their opportunities because the world doesn’t always come to the child who is still. Many times, they have to go crash into it. That’s where these modified cars can make a huge difference.”

Tucker goes on to explain the benefits of movement and play as they relate to a child’s development — affecting cognition, speech and language skills, and self-efficacy.

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, “early learning and play are fundamentally social activities and fuel the development of language and thought. Early learning also combines playful discovery with the development of social-emotional skills.” Plus, “play has been shown to have both direct and indirect effects on brain structure and functioning … [and] usually enhances curiosity, which facilitates memory and learning.”

“So if we can offer a form of movement in the same moment that their peer would experience in a typical developmental timeline, we can hopefully alter that trajectory and maybe prevent some secondary impairments, like diminished self-efficacy, or speech and language delays,” Tucker says. “That’s the goal.”

Tucker thought Galloway’s Go Baby Go! had promise and wanted to learn more. She cold-called Galloway on the spot, and he offered to visit Orlando to collaborate on opening a chapter of Go Baby Go! at UCF.

It seemed like a no-brainer — with three children’s hospitals within a 20-mile radius of the main campus, UCF’s longstanding commitment to community partnership and Orlando’s reputation as a family-friendly destination.

“When Cole visited, he said, ‘Jen, this place is magical. If this should happen anywhere, this should happen here,’ ” Tucker says.

She adds that UCF was unequivocally supportive when she brought the idea to administration, who asked her what she needed to get started. Two months later, thanks in large part to Go Baby Go!’s first philanthropic gift from the Down Syndrome Association of Central Florida, UCF and the community partnered for the chapter’s first car-building event.

“Then it just exploded,” she says.

White and black child-sized SUV with silver grill and black wheels is parked on brown vinyl flooring in room with blue walls. On the right, a red child-sized car with Mickey Mouse sticker on passenger-side door is parked on brown vinyl flooring with blue walls.

“We know when we look at children, from the minute they can figure out their arms and legs move, play is how they learn.” — Jennifer Tucker ’23PhD, Clinical Associate Professor of Physical Therapy

A baby teething toy shaped like a car and car keys

For as long as she can remember, Cami Osier ’15 ’19DPT has been interested in working with children. The push toward physical therapy, she thinks, stems from her own experience observing her older brother’s progression from therapy after he sustained a stroke at the age of 10.

She says he was told he would never walk again. Years later, he started running half marathons.

In 2016, Osier — who is now the associate director of Go Baby Go! and a pediatric therapist for Balanced Baby, a small business that offers prenatal and newborn services — was deep into her first semester of the doctoral physical therapy program (DPT) at UCF when she says she was struggling with rigorous coursework. She felt very disconnected from her “why” — why she even wanted to become a physical therapist.

Go Baby Go! was gearing up for its second carbuilding event, sponsored by Orlando Health, that would produce 10 motorized, child-size Lightning McQueen vehicles. Despite her limited free time, Osier decided to sign up to help, not knowing much more than it was about “kids in cars.”

She showed up and put all her studies into practice (while figuring out power tools she had never used before) to lead a team in outfitting a car for a little boy named Asher.

“We did this big race on Memory Mall, and I just wanted to cry. I thought, ‘This is why I’m doing this,’ ” Osier says. “I knew my purpose, so in that semester I was able to hunker down. Whenever I started to feel that disconnect, I could call back on that moment and remind myself that that was why I was putting myself through the stress of grad school.”

Since then, the program has averaged 10 to 15 workshops from August through May annually to benefit children between the ages of 6 months and 5 years old with mobility issues stemming from Down syndrome, muscular dystrophy, cerebral palsy and osteogenesis, among others.

Every DPT student at UCF is exposed to Go Baby Go! because of the academic program’s curriculum requirements. Participation is not mandatory, but Tucker says inevitably a core group of students every year commits to volunteering every chance they can.

Cait Wilkerson ’20 ’23DPT, who now works locally as a pediatric therapist at BrightStart Pediatrics, was one of those students. She still shows up around Tucker’s lab and Go Baby Go! events. She’s even referred some of her patients to the program.

“I wasn’t interested in pediatrics at first,” says Wilkerson, who was hired at BrightStart immediately after graduation. “Going to Go Baby Go! events made me want to do it more. Now with my job, I work with super complex kids, and my experience at UCF and with Go Baby Go! and Dr. Tucker prepared me for that. It has had a huge impact on what I do now, and why I’m passionate about my job.”

Over the last decade, UCF’s Go Baby Go! has built up such a reputation that prospective students talk about it in their interviews as they look to gain acceptance into the doctoral program. It’s gone international, too, with partnerships in Belgium and Wales. It formed a community advisory board in May 2025 with 13 partners, including Wilkerson, all ready to work together to make children’s lives better and the community stronger.

As word has gotten around, students from other majors have gotten involved. College of Engineering and Computer Science students have helped with the re-wiring required for the cars to go at the push of a button. Education and psychology majors have asked to join, and one College of Medicine student was so impacted by her experience at a build that she asked Tucker to serve as her research mentor. That alum is now training to be a neuro-developmental pediatrician.

“The students are the engine that runs Go Baby Go! I couldn’t do it without them,” Tucker says.

“It’s mutually beneficial for them because this is an opportunity to practice professional skills they are going to need in the workforce: interacting with families, talking with them about a patient’s strengths, assessing the fit of a child in a device,” she adds. “They’re practicing these skills in a way that’s so much more impactful because there’s an actual child in front of them. We’re problem-solving in real time: ‘He can’t lift his shoulders up. What should we do to the button?’ And that’s a different sort of active learning and problem-based learning that really can’t be replicated in a classroom.”

Two male students in black T shirts with orange car graphic on front work on adjusting white child-size car.

“I work with super complex kids, and my experience at UCF and with Go Baby Go! and Dr. Tucker prepared me for that. It has had a huge impact on what I do now.” — Cait Wilkerson ’20 ’23DPT, Health Sciences and Physical Therapy Alum

A rubber ducky

A blonde toddler diagnosed with a form of muscular dystrophy sorts through Mickey Mouse and Bluey stickers for a red Mercedes convertible, which arrived by way of Amazon. Yellow pool noodles flank the sides of the car. A swimming kickboard helps support a padded seat insert. A chunk of an orange pool noodle boosts a blue plastic disc on the top of the steering wheel.

“I’d like to see him with the chest strap and let’s bring the button closer. We’ll see if he can do it. I think he can,” Tucker says.

The tot is a tad apprehensive at first. His mother places her hand on the newly affixed button.

“Can you squish mommy’s hand?”

Challenge accepted. And completed. He smiles.

“I think this placement makes a big difference,” Tucker says.

Tucker then turns to the parents. She gives them two of the three rules she lives by, along with her cellphone number.

No. 1: The car is not therapy. It’s a toy. Go have fun with your child.

No. 2: Have the child wear a helmet, just like they would on a bike.

And then there’s No. 3, her biggest rule: The cars don’t cost anybody anything.

Philanthropy has made that possible through major partnerships with Orlando Health and Variety – the Children’s Charity of Florida, along with nearly 70 other donors from the community.

“Programs like Go Baby Go! reflect Orlando Health’s commitment to meeting children where they are and helping them reach their fullest potential,” says Justin Williams, president of the Orlando Health Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children. “By supporting innovative initiatives that promote mobility, independence and confidence, we’re not just enhancing care — we’re empowering children and their families in meaningful, lasting ways.”

In September 2025, Go Baby Go! welcomed families and partners from the past 10 years to witness then 18-month-old Lucy Luhmann receive the program’s 200th car. The crowd cheered Lucy on as she smiled and drove her white Mercedes car, which matches the vehicle her mom, alumna Jolene Luhmann ’19, owns.

Among the crowd was Noelle Adisano, who at age 11 months, was one of the first children to receive a Go Baby Go! car, which included a Minnie Mouse design. Adisano had gross motor delay, which is a lag in development of large muscle groups that control whole-body motions, due to a partially deleted chromosome. She used the car for over a year, which allowed her to venture outside and cruise along the family’s big circular driveway.

Adisano, now 9, is on to bigger things as a competitive gymnast, following in the footsteps of her big sister, Guiliana.

“That early intervention was key for her,” says her mother, Aimee.

As Go Baby Go! celebrates a decade of impact, Tucker is still most delighted by the simplest of moments.

“I love when families tell me that their kids are having sibling fights about the car, or they had to childproof their house because their kids were banging the car into the walls,” Tucker says. “Those are really exciting moments because these are important rites of passage in childhood. We visited one home and there were tire tracks all over their backyard. I’ve never been so happy in my entire life. That kid tore up the entire backyard. But that’s what he’s supposed to be doing.”

The prospect that excites her most these days is growing UCF’s Kids Building for Kids initiative, which debuted in 2018. So far, they’ve engaged with 2,000 students from Central Florida elementary, middle and high schools in workshops to build cars for children specifically in their communities.

“I think it’s been deeply impactful for a lot of the kids, particularly when they’re in middle school and high school, and considering STEM because these kids are so smart,” Osier says. “When they get a chance to do something for good, you can just see those light bulbs going off: ‘What else could I create that could make someone else’s life more enjoyable? Can I use my brain that I’ve been gifted to make something better for someone else?’ And I think that’s so cool.”

Tucker is eagerly awaiting the moment when she starts to teach UCF students who were first exposed to Go Baby Go! as participants in the Kids Building for Kids program.

“Some of these schools we go to year after year — when I walk in, the students say, ‘Hey, you’re that Go Baby Go! lady.’ And I say, ‘I am that Go Baby Go! lady,’ ” Tucker says with a big smile. “We’ve become a part of their culture, and they associate us with UCF. They get really excited, and they wear their black and gold. These are going to be our future students. We’re going to have kids come to UCF because they were exposed as middle schoolers and they built a car. I can’t wait for that.”

And the driving force behind it all is her team’s unwavering commitment to better the lives of kids.

“We plan to continue to move the needle and hopefully reshape people’s perspectives about the capacity of children,” Tucker says. “Don’t define them. You don’t know who they’re going to be.”

Three students wearing black shirts with orange car graphic on front and yellow Go Baby Go written on back tinker with pink car as they kneel on vinyl flooring.

Jenna Marina Lee Spring 2026

����ֱ��

On the Move

��ֱ��