The sun has not yet risen as physical education teacher Peter Bologna eats his breakfast of peanut butter with 12-grain bread before going to work. And as he makes his way home, sometimes as late as 9 p.m., the sun has long been out of sight.
Bologna woke up early on November 20, 2007, to coach a morning practice for the Pirates, the boys’ varsity swim team, from 6 to 7:15 a.m. After ninth period, that same day, he took the Pinheads, the girls’ varsity bowling team, to Staten Island to face Susan Wagner in a quarterfinal playoff match and didn’t get home until 9 p.m.
In a single day, Bologna coached two different sports teams of two different sexes that belong in two different seasons. “It’s a stressful time,” he said, “but I’m still happy to do it.”
Bologna’s love for sports started in high school, where he played on the baseball team and swam recreationally.
“I was athletic, but never excelled in any one sport,” he said.
In the spring of 1997, Bologna was asked by co-worker and former Stuyvesant assistant varsity football coach David Velkes if he was interested in coaching. At the time, he was working at Seward Park High School on the Lower East Side, where he taught but never coached. He initially rejected Velkes’s offer, but after realizing Stuyvesant had a “good program” he decided to go for the interview, he said. In the fall of 1997, he was hired as the assistant head coach of Stuyvesant’s junior varsity (JV) football team.
Bologna kept this position through the fall of 1999 and became the Stuyvesant JV baseball head coach in the spring of 1998. That year, Seward Park laid him off due to a surplus of teachers in proportion to their student body.
“Enrollment at Seward Park decreased and I got excessed,” Bologna said. He was interviewed by Assistant Principal of Physical Education Martha Singer for a full-time job, which he now fufills. Since then, his presence has been felt in the Stuyvesant community.
“He has grown as a teacher and a coach,” Singer said.
In 2000, Bologna became an assistant coach for the varsity football team. In 2003, he stopped coaching football, citing differences between himself and the team and head coach.
“It was time to move on,” he said. That same year, he became assistant head coach of varsity baseball, before becoming head coach a year later.
“[Bologna] brought energy and a sense of humor,” said senior Scott Ritter, who played baseball under Bologna during his sophomore year.
In 2004, Bologna, along with Singer and former boys’ varsity bowling coach Larry Barth formed the girls’ bowling team.
He also began coaching the Pirates. His license was for swimming and he had always wanted to coach a winter sport. He learned many techniques of coaching the boys’ swim team from former girls’ and boys’ swim team coach Silvanna Choy. “I consider myself influenced a lot by her,” he said.
While he upheld many traditions Choy had with the Pirates, such as their uniform head-shaving and sportsmanship, he also started some of his own.
“I upped the amount of yards during practice,” Bologna said. Bologna decided to stop coaching baseball after the 2006 season, the year of the tragic deaths of Stuyvesant swimmers Kevin Kwan and April Lao.
“Both Choy and Bologna put themselves on the back burner, as in they were very concerned as an adult and a coach,” Singer said. Both coaches had to deal with their own grief while also looking out for their athletes.
“He made it a very big deal that we were as comfortable as possible in coping with the situation,” senior and Pirate William Chiang said. “He reassured us about how we were supposed to feel about the incident.”
“It was really not doing a job I was comfortable doing,” he said, of coaching the baseball team. “I didn’t want to work after school every day from September to May and I felt that the baseball team was in good hands.” Varsity baseball coaches John Carlesi and Matthew Hahn have filled in for him but “a piece of the team was definitely missing,” Ritter said.
Indeed, the baseball players had developed a bond with Bologna shared by athletes on all teams he coaches.
“He gets along great with the students and the athletes,” Singer said.
“He shows dedication by having morning practice,” senior and Pirates co-captain Andrew Wong said.
“He knows exactly what someone needs to do to improve,” senior and Pirates’ manager Michelle Wong said. “He’s strict to the extent that the team respects him. He treats us like pro athletes.”
Bologna does not plan to stop coaching anytime soon.
“I take pride in what I do,” Bologna said, “and so do my athletes.”