When it comes to dedication, Matt Link’s photo might appear next to the definition in Webster’s. Matt has been with Madison Public School for close to three decades and the last 20 of those as Polson Middle School’s physical education director, where he has built a reputation as one of Madison’s most dedicated educators.

Matt is a beloved coach and mentor who goes above and beyond his duties to ensure everyone at Polson has fun and participates, according to staff and students.

According to Matt, he was pretty much born into his role as a coach and physical education teacher. He grew up in a sports family, with his dad being his golf coach and sports mentor, instilling in him a strong belief in the positive power of sports.

“I grew up in Tolland, up at the other end of the state. My dad was a phys ed teacher and athletic director, and coach, so I kind of grew up knowing what that career path was all about. In the summertime, I worked at the rec department in Tolland doing sports camps, so I’ve done this a while,” says Matt. “It’s really what I knew. My dad was my phys ed teacher and my golf coach and my soccer coach. I played soccer in college, so in the summertime, I would work soccer camps, so I was always around kids, teaching kids, playing sports. I was pretty fixed on being a phys ed teacher.”

Matt has been with Madison Public Schools since 1995, when he began his career at Brown Middle School. He later moved to Polson, where he has been for over two decades.

“I was transferred to Polson, which was the old high school, from Brown about 20 years ago. I’ve been at Polson ever since, and this will mark my 28th year with Madison — 20 years at Polson and eight at Brown,” says Matt. “I went to Springfield College in 1994 and was sending out resumes everywhere, in-state, out-of-state, wherever I could get a teaching job. I happened to look in a paper, and there was an opening at a middle school in Madison. All my student teaching was at the high school, I had never taught middle school before, but I went down and interviewed…and I got the job. I was 22 years old or so, and I was just looking to land a PE job. I’m not sure I realized then how lucky I was. Looking back on it, I was extremely fortunate to get a job in Madison. It’s been a great school system to work for.”

Matt laughs when he’s asked how he finds time to sleep, as his days are jammed tight with not just school duties but after-school, intramural, summer camps, and other coaching and mentoring activities. Matt says he can still carve out moments to squeeze in his own activities too.

“I continue to do intramural sports at Polson. I run a volleyball program for sixth, seventh, and eighth graders in the springtime,” says Matt. “In the summertime, I’ve been doing sports camps with the rec department for about twenty years; I do golf camp, fishing camp, and mountain bike camp. I really enjoy hunting and fishing around here. In summer, we vacation in Maine and do a lot of fishing in Maine. I still play soccer on Wednesday nights with guys here in Killingworth to stay in shape. I work out in the morning time with the F3 guys; there’s a group of guys that work out in Madison in the mornings. But when I want to relax, I try to get out in the woods or on the water. Fortunately, I have a very supportive wife, Christine. She is very, very supportive and allows me that time to rest and relax.”

Matt has been the coach for unified sports at Polson and Daniel Hand for years, and his colleagues credit Matt with having created the school system program. Matt says a student teaching assignment at his first education posting planted a seed that continued to develop as he gained experience.

“I first found out about unified sports when I was doing my student teaching at South Windsor High School,” says Matt. “One of the guidance counselors there had this program with special needs students and peers, and he knew I was student teaching, so he said, ‘You got to stay after school and help me with coaching this team.’ And it was great. It was a great experience. Then I got the job in Madison, and I did some interscholastic coaching. I coached a middle school soccer team and the high school soccer team and did a year of volleyball at hand, so I was busy pretty much all year. I was also going to school to get my master’s degree and eventually my administrator’s degree. I actually wanted to slow down a bit, and I stopped coaching varsity. Then I approached Frank Henderson, who was the principal at Polson at that time, and said I’d like to start up a unified program with the middle school kids, and he came on board one hundred percent. We started with basketball and added soccer, and then volleyball and track and field.”

Matt didn’t stop there, and as his students began transitioning to upper trade levels, he formulated the system’s overall unified program.

“As those kids cycled through middle school and into high school, I stayed with them, and now I’ve been doing unified at Daniel Hand High School about 15 years or so,” Matt says. “It was such a good opportunity to continue coaching and working with students outside of a classroom setting. It just seemed like the right thing to do. We had students who would benefit, certainly, from not just the physical exercise of playing sports but with the teamwork and cooperation. Being a teacher, it wasn’t too difficult to recruit peers to help out.”

According to Matt, unified programs have a number of benefits for everyone who participates. Matt says the ability to get every student involved and participating magnifies the positive elements of sport.

“I think the peers are appreciative of the opportunity to help out their school and classmates; it’s all about cooperation, teamwork, and sportsmanship. It’s almost a sense of giving back to their school for these peers, I think,” says Matt. “The special needs kids get to take bus rides to other schools, traveling like every other interscholastic sports team would; playing sports is just naturally a fun activity. They get exercise, and that’s a secondary benefit, but the teamwork and the socializing with their peers in an after-school setting is a win for all students.”

Matt isn’t one to take credit or pat himself on the back and praises all of his colleagues at the various schools who Matt says are as dedicated and passionate group of educators as you’re likely to find anywhere.

“I can say I started this on my own, but I have assistant coaches for years who teach at the high school; Diane Damelio and Jamie Nocera, those two are incredible. I have a very good support team with those two who have been part of this for years. They can probably run this better than I can now. I think it’s in good hands. The administrators in the system are very supportive as well. My principal, Kathryn Hart at Polson, and TJ Salutari, principal at the high school, are extremely supportive of unified sports, as well as Liz Battaglia, who is head of the special education program. It is very easy to work with those administrators. The athletic directors are great, too, and very supportive. It’s hard to do this without that support from the top. This is a team effort.”

When it comes to dedication, Matt Link’s photo might appear next to the definition in Webster’s. Matt has been with Madison Public Schools for close to three decades and the last 20 of those as Polson Middle School’s physical education director, where he has built a reputation as one of Madison’s most dedicated educators.

Matt is a beloved coach and mentor who goes above and beyond his duties to ensure everyone at Polson has fun and participates, according to staff and students.

According to Matt, he was pretty much born into his role as a coach and physical education teacher. He grew up in a sports family, with his dad being his golf coach and sports mentor, instilling in him a strong belief in the positive power of sports.

“I grew up in Tolland, up at the other end of the state. My dad was a phys ed teacher and athletic director, and coach, so I kind of grew up knowing what that career path was all about. In the summertime, I worked at the rec department in Tolland doing sports camps, so I’ve done this a while,” says Matt. “It’s really what I knew. My dad was my phys ed teacher and my golf coach and my soccer coach. I played soccer in college, so in the summertime, I would work soccer camps, so I was always around kids, teaching kids, playing sports. I was pretty fixed on being a phys ed teacher.”

Matt has been with Madison Public Schools since 1995, when he began his career at Brown Middle School. He later moved to Polson, where he has been for over two decades.

“I was transferred to Polson, which was the old high school, from Brown about 20 years ago. I’ve been at Polson ever since, and this will mark my 28th year with Madison — 20 years at Polson and eight at Brown,” says Matt. “I went to Springfield College in 1994 and was sending out resumes everywhere, in-state, out-of-state, wherever I could get a teaching job. I happened to look in a paper, and there was an opening at a middle school in Madison. All my student teaching was at the high school, I had never taught middle school before, but I went down and interviewed…and I got the job. I was 22 years old or so, and I was just looking to land a PE job. I’m not sure I realized then how lucky I was. Looking back on it, I was extremely fortunate to get a job in Madison. It’s been a great school system to work for.”

Matt laughs when he’s asked how he finds time to sleep, as his days are jammed tight with not just school duties but after-school, intramural, summer camps, and other coaching and mentoring activities. Matt says he can still carve out moments to squeeze in his own activities too.

“I continue to do intramural sports at Polson. I run a volleyball program for sixth, seventh, and eighth graders in the springtime,” says Matt. “In the summertime, I’ve been doing sports camps with the rec department for about 20 years; I do golf camp, fishing camp, and mountain bike camp. I really enjoy hunting and fishing around here. In summer, we vacation in Maine and do a lot of fishing in Maine. I still play soccer on Wednesday nights with guys here in Killingworth to stay in shape. I work out in the morning time with the F3 guys; there’s a group of guys that work out in Madison in the mornings. But when I want to relax, I try to get out in the woods or on the water. Fortunately, I have a very supportive wife, Christine. She is very, very supportive and allows me that time to rest and relax.”

Matt has been the coach for unified sports at Polson and Daniel Hand for years, and his colleagues credit Matt with having created the school system program. He says a student teaching assignment at his first education posting planted a seed that continued to develop as he gained experience.

“I first found out about unified sports when I was doing my student teaching at South Windsor High School,” says Matt. “One of the guidance counselors there had this program with special needs students and peers, and he knew I was student teaching, so he said, ‘You got to stay after school and help me with coaching this team.’ And it was great. It was a great experience. Then I got the job in Madison, and I did some interscholastic coaching. I coached a middle school soccer team and the high school soccer team and did a year of volleyball at Hand, so I was busy pretty much all year.”

He adds, “I was also going to school to get my master’s degree and eventually my administrator’s degree. I actually wanted to slow down a bit, and I stopped coaching varsity. Then I approached Frank Henderson, who was the principal at Polson at that time, and said I’d like to start up a unified program with the middle school kids, and he came on board one hundred percent. We started with basketball and added soccer, and then volleyball and track and field.”

Matt didn’t stop there, and as his students began transitioning to upper trade levels, he formulated the system’s overall unified program.

“As those kids cycled through middle school and into high school, I stayed with them, and now I’ve been doing unified at Daniel Hand High School about 15 years or so,” Matt says. “It was such a good opportunity to continue coaching and working with students outside of a classroom setting. It just seemed like the right thing to do. We had students who would benefit, certainly, from not just the physical exercise of playing sports but with the teamwork and cooperation. Being a teacher, it wasn’t too difficult to recruit peers to help out.”

According to Matt, unified programs have a number of benefits for everyone who participates. Matt says the ability to get every student involved and participating magnifies the positive elements of sports.

“I think the peers are appreciative of the opportunity to help out their school and classmates; it’s all about cooperation, teamwork, and sportsmanship. It’s almost a sense of giving back to their school for these peers, I think,” says Matt. “The special needs kids get to take bus rides to other schools, traveling like every other interscholastic sports team would; playing sports is just naturally a fun activity. They get exercise, and that’s a secondary benefit, but the teamwork and the socializing with their peers in an after-school setting is a win for all students.”

Matt isn’t one to take credit or pat himself on the back, and he praises all of his colleagues at the various schools who Matt says are as dedicated and passionate group of educators as anyone is likely to find anywhere.

“I can say I started this on my own, but I have assistant coaches for years who teach at the high school; Diane Damelio and Jamie Nocera, those two are incredible. I have a very good support team with those two who have been part of this for years. They can probably run this better than I can now. I think it’s in good hands. The administrators in the system are very supportive as well. My principal, Kathryn Hart at Polson, and TJ Salutari, principal at the high school, are extremely supportive of unified sports, as well as Liz Battaglia, who is head of the special education program. It is very easy to work with those administrators. The athletic directors are great, too, and very supportive. It’s hard to do this without that support from the top. This is a team effort.”