Three former Penn State Behrend student-athletes recently spearheaded a drive to establish an endowed fund to support the school’s varsity sports in honor of longtime Athletics Director Roger Sweeting.

Sweeting, who retired from the school’s kinesiology and health education faculty in 1996 and today lives in Arizona, was an administrator, coach and professor at the school for 33 years.

“When it comes to athletics and student-athletes, I cannot think of another person who has meant so much to so many people,” said university Chancellor Jack Burke. “Roger’s decades of hard work and dedication to Penn State Behrend fostered growth in students on an individual level. Now, as alumni, they have created this endowment as a way to honor him.”

Three of those alumni, all former basketball student-athletes, led the effort to establish the endowment.

E. Joseph Williams (who still ranks among Penn State Behrend career statistical leaders in scoring average, rebounds and steals) and Bruce Reinhardt were members of the 1966-67 team that won a state junior college championship and Duane May was a member of the school’s undefeated 1967-68 squad.

Sweeting coached basketball, baseball and men’s soccer – the only sports the school sponsored when he was hired in 1963. Under his administration, the program expanded from three to 10 sports and today sponsors 21 sports.

As athletics director, he served during the school’s transition from a two-year to four-year institution and also oversaw the introduction of women’s varsity sports. He served two stints as AD, from 1963 to 1969 and 1972 to 1981, and retired as associate professor emeritus of kinesiology and health education.