Burke returns to CHA as new A.D.
by TOM UTESCHER
In hiring a successor for outgoing athletic director Stan Parker, Chestnut Hill Academy didn’t have to stray far from home.
Mark Burke, who grew up in Wyncote and was the second of four brothers to graduate from CHA, has ended his seven-year tenure as assistant basketball coach at Millersville University in order to take the helm of the sports program at his alma mater.
Burke graduated from Chestnut Hill in 1986, and went on to play basketball at Moravian College in Bethlehem, PA, where he was a sociology major. Subsequently, he earned a Masters degree in Education & Sports Administration at Millersville. In returning to pilot the Blue Devils’ athletic department, he’s fulfilling a longtime ambition.
“I’ve always wanted to get into administration,” he revealed. “In fact, I always joked with Mr. Talbot [longtime CHA A.D. Jim Talbot] when I was attending Chestnut Hill that I was going to take his job someday. So it finally happened.”
Following Talbot’s retirement, Stan Parker served in the post for four years, and he will now become the school’s Dean of Faculty and chairman of the history department.
“Organized and dedicated are two words that come to mind with Mark,” said the outgoing A.D., who participated in the selection process. “He’s young and I think he’ll be aggressive in his approach, which will be good for the program.”
Parker, who coached Burke in baseball, added “His familiarity with the Inter-Ac League is a major asset, and his many connections in the Philadelphia area make him a known commodity.”
Along with his older brother Jim and younger brothers Andrew and Paul, Mark Burke was a three-season athlete for the Blue Devils. He played football and baseball at the local school, and in basketball, he was a four-year varsity player for CHA and was a winner of Philadelphia’s Markward Award.
After graduating from Moravian in 1992, he was an assistant varsity basketball coach first at CHA and then at Souderton High School. He joined the Millersville staff in the same capacity in the fall of 1997. He coached extensively in non-school settings, as well, serving as mentor in the nationally-known Sonny Hill Basketball League, and working at numerous basketball camps. For several years in the mid-nineties, Burke was the director of the Larry Hyde Super Sports Camp in the Chestnut Hill area, and most recently he’s been involved with the Global Sports Academy in Paoli, PA.
Earlier this year, he received a phone call from his sister Maureen (a Springside School alumna), who had learned from their brother Andrew (now a teacher and coach at Germantown Academy) about the opening in the A.D.’s office at CHA.
“It was time for me to move on from Millersville; I’d done as much as I could there as an assistant coach,” he explained. “At the same time, CHA has done so much for me that I felt it was time for me to give back to the school. I had so many people there who were a great influence upon me; Mr. Baumberger, Mr. Plunkett, Mr. McArdle and Mr. Parker. They’re all still there, too, and they’ve been helping me a lot with making this transition.”
Personal connections aside, Burke noted, “CHA is a great school academically, and you’ve got a chance to build things around that. You’re also in the Inter-Ac League, which is very competitive in just about every sport, and it’s a group of schools with outstanding reputations.”
In discussing the goals for the athletic program with CHA Headmaster Frank Steel and other administrators, Burke ascertained “They want to go to the next level. They want to put teams out on the field or on the floor that are competitive, that have a chance to win.”
Chestnut Hill should soon have a slightly larger pool of students to draw from, as plans call for the addition of ten to 15 students per grade. In the upcoming academic year (2004-‘05), CHA will revive the ice hockey program which expired during the 1980's, and will offer lacrosse as an interscholastic sport for the first time.
“It’s hard to be a school without lacrosse now,” Burke said, “Especially in this area, where there are a lot of successful teams.”
All of the other five Inter-Ac schools play lacrosse, and all except Penn Charter offer ice hockey.
CHA has renovated many of its outdoor facilities over the past decade, but its “vintage” gymnasium and locker room areas are sorely in need of a similar upgrade.
“I sat in on one of the planning meetings and I’ve seen the master plan for the new indoor complex,” the new A.D. says. “From what I’ve gathered you’ll see the start of it in three or four years, and that’s another thing that should give a big boost to the sports program.