By Christian Lynch
A little over a year ago, long-time Kingsway Athletic Director Joe Galliera announced his retirement, and former Woodstown Athletic Director June Cioffi took over. With a strong athletic career herself at Glassboro High School and Glassboro State College, she knew the pressures of being a top-notch athlete today.
Professionally, her varied teaching and administrative experiences at Highland, Timber Creek, and Woodstown gave her a perspective of Kingsway, old and new. A former Olympic Conference Athletic Director of the Year, she also is the vice-president of the South Jersey Coaches Association as well as secretary for the Tri-County Conference athletic directors.
All of these experiences made her a great fit for Kingsway. After one year under Cioffi, the Kingsway athletic program continues to be one of the top athletic programs in New Jersey.
Team-wise, Kingsway earned six divisional, three county, one overall conference, two South Jersey, and two state championships over the course of the school year. They recently earned the “All-Sports Award” as the top athletic program in the Tri-County Conference for the 2014-15 year.
So where does Cioffi see the current state affairs for Kingsway athletics?
“I think we made strides in developing our ‘Committed to Excellence’ mantra within the athletic department,” said Cioffi.” We have begun to see buy-in and a real connection within our athletic department. The teams are supporting each other and coming together as an entire district, grades seven through 12. I want to continue to promote our athletic department as being ‘one team’ and doing things together as a group.”
As for the future, Cioffi has major plans for improvement within her department.
“I want to continue building our connection with the middle school and instilling our traditions with our 7th graders,” said Cioffi. “Bringing our athletic summits, which act as part pep rally and part expectation meeting, to the middle school have helped with this.”
“I still want to continue promoting Kingsway athletics more in the school district and in the community in general. I want to get our faculty and staff to come out and support our athletes at their games.”
“In line with the tremendous population growth within our sending districts, I want to be a part of growing and expanding our athletic complex into one of the best in South Jersey. As a Group 4 school, and Group 5 in some sports, our facilities should reflect the excellence that this district prizes. We are committed to housing our student-athletes in arenas that maximize their potential.”
With Cioffi at the athletic helm for Kingsway, the future certainly looks exciting, progressive, and extremely bright.
