Joe Battista

  • Battista: Family Adventures Are Priceless

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    Joe Battista

    If I could do it all over again, the advice I would give my younger self as a parent would have been to stretch our family budget, just a little more, and find a way to take the family on a few more adventures.  Having just returned from an amazing nine-day trip out west to…

  • Battista: God Just Doesn’t Make Them Any Better Than Our Friend Tim

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    Joe Battista

    The State College community lost one of its best residents last week, someone who many of you probably didn’t even know.  His name was Tim Holdcroft, and he was the epitome of an unsung hero in life, with family, at work, in his church and in the community. His untimely death has devastated family and…

  • Battista: Campus Memories

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    Joe Battista

    Almost everyone has some fond memories of campus experiences, whether you’ve graduated from high school, trade school, college or military boot camp (well, maybe not fond memories of boot camp). If you’re a Penn State Alumni Association member and receive the Penn Stater Magazine, you have undoubtedly enjoyed the periodic articles about campus memories.  Most…

  • Battista: Service to Others Is a Mindset, and a Gift

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    Joe Battista

    We just completed our eighth year of Overspeed Hockey camps in Sun Valley, Idaho. That’s 16 weeks of service to over 700 kids predominantly from Idaho but with some coming from Washington, Oregon, Montana, California, Utah, Wyoming and even as far away as Florida, It’s a great camp in a gorgeous area of the country. …

  • Destinations: Dreams and Realities

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    Joe Battista

    I recently became one of the newest members of the Medicare Club. My 87-year-old mother called to wish me happy birthday and said, “My baby is 65!”  No way am I 65, I thought. Old people are 65! I feel like I’m living my best life right now and suddenly it dawned on me that…

  • Battista: There Is Always Hope

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    Joe Battista

    If you follow my columns, you know that I gave up all of my social media, except for LinkedIn, which I have only kept for business purposes. My self-imposed digital detox has been in place since Christmas break of 2020 (You can read about it here). I am a big advocate of “JOMO” – the…

  • For the Pure Joy of It

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    Joe Battista

    I was recently back in Happy Valley for a few days to do a little work at our family townhouse and to facilitate a two-day Pragmatic Passion training program for Dallastown Area School District’s Leadership Team at the newly renovated Nittany Lion Inn. While in town, I had the pleasure of getting to see an…

  • The Lasting Impact of a Coach

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    Joe Battista

    “You coach a person, not a sport.”  — John O’Sullivan School is over or ending just about everywhere, and the multi-billion-dollar summer camp industry is about to begin in earnest.  According to IBISWorld (Industry, Business & Investment Services) the U.S. camp industry, which includes sports and recreational camps, has a direct and indirect economic impact…

  • A Nod to Nonnas

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    Joe Battista

    How many different names do you know for grandmother? I did a quick search on the internet (for this column I used “The Bump”) and it came up with hundreds from all over the world. But here is a small sample for you to feast on: Granny (Grannie), Grammy (Grammie), Gammie, Nan, Gigi, Gan-Gan, Maw-Maw,…

  • The Baseball World Is Going Bananas

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    Joe Battista

    They are billed as “The Greatest Show in Sports.” They were featured recently on CBS’s “60 Minutes.” They have a 10-game broadcast deal with ESPN networks. They have played in sold-out NFL and college football stadiums, and numerous MLB stadiums. They have more social media followers than every MLB franchise…combined.  Say it ain’t so, Joe! Baseball…