Photo Courtesy of Chris Troyano
GLEN RIDGE, NJ — William Indek, the former Glen Ridge High School cross-country and track coach, and guidance counselor, recently recalled how being a counselor informed his approach to coaching.
Born in the Bronx, Indek, 75, grew up on Staten Island, attending Port Richmond High School, where he ran cross-country and track. He then attended Syracuse University, graduating in 1968.
For the next three three years, he taught social studies at Eastwood Junior High School in Syracuse. During that time, he received his master’s degree in guidance counseling from his alma mater.
“I had tenure but no experience,” he said. “So, my wife and I decided we’d go to Brooklyn where I’d teach. When they tore down Ebbets Field, the Brooklyn Dodgers ballpark, they built Junior High School No. 320. I was literally in left field.”
Indek had been teaching at No. 320 for a year when, “as luck would have it,” he said, the Glen Ridge Public Schools posted an ad for a guidance counselor.
“I was fortunate enough for them to give me a chance because I had experience with eighth- and ninth-graders,” he said.
At that time, seventh- and eighth-graders were at the Ridgewood Avenue School site; the upper grades were across the street in the high school building. Indek shuttled between the two schools from 1972 to 2008, when he retired.
“I loved my job and was fortunate,” he said. “The principals in the middle school, David Maltman, and high school, James Buckley, gave me a lot of latitude. They trusted my judgment. I guess they figured my heart was in the right place.”
Indek, a Bloomfield resident, said he arrived early to work and left late. He coached cross-country from 1981 to 2003 and would have coached longer but wanted to see his son participate in sports at Bloomfield High School. Indek coached indoor track from 1992 to 2001 and outdoor track from 1981 to 2003, but it was during his first indoor years that he made a singular impact.
“We had a budget situation in 1990-91,” he said. “The superintendent of schools, Marcia Bossart, wanted to save money, and, to do that, she wanted to cut back on sports. She didn’t direct the athletic director what to drop, but the director, Paul Palek, said we’d drop indoor track. For outdoor track, we had girls and boys teams. He combined them and cut two coaches.”
According to Indek, who was the girls outdoor coach, he kept his job along with the other girls coach, Neil McShane. Indek was offered the same salary to coach double the students.
The announcement that indoor track was being dropped came at the end of 1991. But a group of indoor runners asked Indek if he would be their supervisor for a running “club.” It would be an unpaid position. He agreed.
“They were a neat bunch of kids,” he said. “There were about 20. We first practiced three days a week but expanded to five because of their commitment.”
Showing such dedication, Indek wanted the runners to compete in countywide meets. Palek agreed to pay the entry fees while Indek and parents provided transportation.
“That went on for three seasons, 1992, ’93 and ’94,” he said. “In ’93, I had a really good group of runners. The girls won the state medley as a club.”
A medley is a relay race of four runners with increasing distances for each “leg”: quarter-mile, half-mile, three-quarter mile and mile.
“Here’s the irony,” Indek continued. “They were state champs but weren’t eligible for varsity letters because they were a club team. And in ’94, one of those girls, Jessica King, won the county and state championships in the 2-mile. She was invited to the Meet of Champions and won that, too, but still couldn’t get a varsity letter.”
Following the ’94 season, Indek said, there was a successful petition by parents and students to have indoor track reinstated as a varsity sport.
Indek said he coached like a guidance counselor.
“The day after a meet, we’d have a meeting,” he said. “Each kid would stand up to share what they learned and their experience the day before. Then I’d have the whole team vote who gave the best effort. I wanted camaraderie. Even if a kid was finishing dead last, the team would cheer them on.
“And as a guidance counselor, I made sure they kept their grades up,” he continued. “If they had a big test the next day, I’d tell them to skip practice to study.”
In 2004, Indek was honored by the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association with an award recognizing his commitment to developing student-athletes. In 2008, he was voted into the school’s sports hall of fame, and the senior yearbook was dedicated to him.
“That was a very heart-warming gift,” he said.
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