We will be honoring one of Stuyvesant’s most beloved and longest tenured faculty, James Lonardo, at the 2023 Benefit for Stuyvesant at Tribeca Rooftop on May 23!

Purchase tickets here to celebrate Mr. Lonardo and other notable members of the community at Stuyvesant’s biggest event of the year!

The 2023 Benefit for Stuyvesant will be honoring Technology teacher James “Jim” Lonardo with the Outstanding Teacher Award. This year is Mr. Lonardo’s 39th year at Stuyvesant, making him and Ms. Julie Sheinman the school’s two longest tenured faculty still teaching today. In fact, Mr. Lonardo has worked at Stuyvesant his whole career. His first job after graduating from NYU in 1984 was as a technology teacher at Stuy, which he described as “like winning the lottery.”

For almost four decades after, Lonardo remained a fixture in Stuyvesant’s Tech Department although the classes he taught changed with the times. His first class in 1984 was Graphic Arts which included setting type by hand, mimeography, spirit duplicating, and making rubber stamps. Later, he also taught Photography, Woodworking, and Jewelry Making before settling into his now permanent classes of Ceramics and Technical Drawing (a.k.a. Drafting).

Mr. Lonardo was a favorite teacher for many Stuy students. “He was one of those teachers who always encouraged you to do your best. At the same time, he also taught that it was okay to not do well or even fail in your endeavors. That comforting environment is a welcome contrast to the intense competitiveness of many other Stuy classes,” says Rachael Biscocho ’12.

Besides the Tech classes that he taught, Mr. Lonardo took an active part in a lot of well-known Stuyvesant extracurriculars. Through his work as the faculty advisor for Stuyvesant’s yearbook, The Indicator, since 1986, he has helped shape the memories of every Stuy graduate for the last 37 years. Joanna Gao ’12 who served as one of the editors of the 2012 Indicator said, “Mr. Lonardo would always spend extra hours after work helping us curate our yearbook. He was an amazing mentor, teacher, and role model for all of us.”

Mr. Lonardo has also served as a coach for Stuyvesant’s Robotics Team, StuyPulse, since 2003. He was instrumental in growing StuyPulse from a team of 15 to more than 200 members today. When Mr. Lonardo first joined the team, he only intended to facilitate the logistics of the team. However, with each passing year, Mr. Lonardo became increasingly more involved and brought his expertise in technical drawing and CAD. Both skills proved to be extremely helpful in guiding StuyPulse’s robot designs to a much higher level.

For his work with StuyPulse, Mr. Lonardo was presented with the Woodie Flowers Award in 2018, a prestigious award given to one mentor each year for their work in leading, inspiring, and empowering students within the FIRST Robotics Competition. From the essay written by Stuyvesant’s Robotics Team which nominated Mr. Lonardo for the award, “[Mr. Lonardo] motivates us to become more ambitious in our designs and the execution of those designs. As the only mentor with a technical certification—without him we can’t use our machines—[Mr. Lonardo] stays with us and gives us his time so we can build our best bot—even if it means receiving no payment for his overtime work. He makes sure that other mentors allow us to make mistakes instead of doing things for us so we learn from our errors. Aside from organizing all essential forms… he goes the extra mile and drives our crucial tools to and from the NYC Regional each year. Without [him], we wouldn’t even be able to compete!”

When asked about his involvement with The Indicator and StuyPulse, Mr. Lonardo downplays his role. “A couple of the students from the 1986-87 yearbook approached me when the previous faculty advisor was stepping down. The Indicator was very much student-run, I was just the adult in the room to sometimes guide them and support them and help proof the yearbooks.” Similarly, StuyPulse just needed another teacher with a Tech certification to be in the room with the students, “I didn’t actually know that much about Robotics but I just wanted to help out.”

Mr. Lonardo’s generosity with his time must have been well known among both his colleagues and the student body because he was also asked to serve as Senior Class Advisor (coordinates prom, graduation, awards nights, and other senior events) for a few years before the role landed with Mr. Trainor and then Mr. Polazzo. And for a period of time, he also served as Coordinator for the Tech Department to help out Dr. Wheeler, then Assistant Principal of Technology and Arts.

When we asked Mr. Lonardo to reflect on his long and varied career at Stuyvesant and pinpoint his favorite parts, he said he “loved being in the classrooms… and the kids always amaze and inspire him.” He also marvels at the artistic talents of Stuy kids, a facet of our identity that not many recognize given our STEM-oriented reputation. In his lengthy career, Mr. Lonardo taught Graphic Arts to Lucy Liu ’86 and also got to know Telly Leung ’98 who was a Big Sib in his homeroom. He still remembers their performances in various STC (Stuyvesant Theater Community) productions before they gained fame on Hollywood and Broadway. And perhaps that’s one of the longer term benefits of all the roles that Mr. Lonardo has taken on over the years – to see Stuyvesant students who are passionate in the arts and engineering from his classes, The Indicator, and Robotics grow into successful adults in their current fields.