SUNY Brockport Athletics

Joseph A. “Big Joe” Bellanca
Retired, Director of Career Planning Services
Board of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES)
Honeoye Falls, New York

The College at Brockport 
            Undergraduate Major: Education ’59 
            Certificate of Advanced Study in Educational Administration ’82

Nazareth College ’78 
            Master’s Degree: Education

Syracuse University:
            Post graduate studies in Educational Administration

Four-year member of the College’s football team (1955-1958) where he starred on both the offensive and defensive lines; helped lead team to its first winning season (4-2-1) in 1957.

In 1987, became the historian and lead organizer of the early generation of Brockport football (from 1947 to the early 1960s) and led the planning and implementation of the 30-year reunion of the program’s first winning team; was a key member of the 50-year anniversary football celebration group in the mid-1990s; led the funding effort to raise more than $100,000 to name “Bob Boozer Field” at the stadium at the College in honor of his coach (and the “father” of the football program); member of the Friends of Brockport Athletics (FOBA) and its successor, the Golden Eagle Society, since the 1980s.

Served on the College’s Governmental Relations Committee (1986-87), Alumni Scholarship Committee (1988-89), Hall of Fame selection committee (1993-94) and Brockport Alumni Association Board of Directors (2003-04); Brockport Alumni Association Citation of Appreciation Award recipient in 1997; numerous honors and recognitions through BOCES; served Honeoye Falls-Lima as a Board of Education member (1981-87) and President (1986-87).