SIDNEY — The Sidney City Schools Hall of Honor will add four new inductees on Friday, April 22, 2022, at 7 p.m. in the Sidney High School auditorium to celebrate 27 years of the Hall of Honor and increase membership to 135 since its founding. Of those to receive the highest honor bestowed by Sidney City Schools is dedicated former educator and coach for Sidney City Schools, Eric “Rug” Harlamert.
Harlamert grew up in Sidney and graduated from Sidney High School in 1976. He attended Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, from where he graduated in 1980 with a bachelor’s degree in Math Education. He also earned a master’s degree in education in 1988 from The College of Mount St. Joseph.
A dream come true, Harlamert was hired to teach math at Sidney High School in the fall following his college graduation. He taught at SHS for 31 years and retired in 2011. As a private pilot, and with the help of one of his former soccer players who is now a Southwest Airlines pilot, Harlamert created and conducted a Geometry in Aviation field trip which he held multiple times at the Sidney airport.
Harlamert loved to teach math, but coaching high school sports became a big part of his career. Just prior to his first year of teaching he was asked by the SHS athletic director if he would be interested in coaching something. Harlamert decided to give it a try and accepted the position of assistant soccer coach. The school and community soccer programs at that time were in their infancy. Harlamert found he really liked coaching and decided to deeply commit to learning the game of soccer. Eric eventually earned the most advanced soccer coaching diploma available in 1996 from the NSCAA (National Soccer Coaches Association of America).
Harlamert went on to be the head coach of boys soccer at SHS for 29 years, from 1982 to 1996 and 2001 to 2014. His team won the GWOC North in 2007, 2008 and 2009; and shared the title in 2010 and 2011. Harlamert was selected as league or division coach of the year in 1994, 2004, 2007, and 2009. His program helped to produce a boys player of the year, numerous All-State players, and two Scholar All-Americans. When he retired from coaching soccer in 2014, Harlamert was in the top 30 winningest coaches in the history of OHSAA boys soccer. Harlamert also loved to coach baseball, and was the SHS JV baseball coach for 21 years.
It was Harlamert’s most important goal to encourage and build confidence in his players and to let them know he was “in the battle” with them both in the sport and in life as well. He also wanted his players to be challenged, develop friendships, have fun, and be young gentlemen in a highly competitive environment.
Nowadays, Harlamert loves the occasions when he can catch up with his former players and math students. He studies Christian apologetics, especially concerning where science and the Bible agree. He loves to play and teach golf, go on adventures in the Rocky Mountains, scuba dive, fly airplanes and listen to classical music.
Other members of the induction class being honored are Congressman Warren Davidson (SHS 1988), Erin Johnson (SHS 2000), and the late Rob Joslin (SHS 1971). A gymnasium reception will precede the ceremony beginning at 6:00PM in the gymnasium; both events are open to the public.
