Nick Bollettieri attended Pelham Memorial High School in his home town and was a charter member of the Beta Lambda Chapter of the Omega Gamma Delta Fraternity, graduating in 1949. He graduated in 1953 from Spring Hill College (Mobile, Alabama) with a degree in philosophy. After serving with the United States Army, attaining the rank of First Lieutenant, he turned in 1956 to teaching tennis after dropping out of the University of Miami Law School. Bollettieri's first students included Sheryl Smith and Brian Gottfried. His first formal tennis camp was at Wayland Academy in Beaver Dam, Wisconsin.