OGDEN, Utah – Elementary school teachers in the Ogden School District received $600 to help with the supplies budget for each of their classrooms thanks to Real Salt Lake’s “Scoring for Schools” campaign and other sponsors.

“It is amazing,” said New Bridge School principal Janice Bukey. “We have the best community support here in Ogden, and this is just another measurement of that. This is going to be such a lift for all of the elementary school teachers in Ogden.”

Half of the donation announced Monday comes from the “Scoring for Schools” campaign and MarketStar, a local Ogden company, while the other half will come from the Ogden School Foundation.

“An opportunity to give back to the Ogden School District was something we appreciated, and we’re grateful for the opportunity,” said MarketStar President & CEO Keith Titus. “We feel like the teachers really make a difference in the schools. That teacher who cares, who has the resources available to them to be creative and bring unique programs to the students, is really what creates that magic in the classroom.”

While there were reasons to keep the kids excited and entertained with appearances from former RSL goalkeeper Nick Rimando and mascot Leo the Lion, Monday was really for the teachers, like Alma Palmer.

Palmer teaches at New Bridge School, which has an extra focus on key STEM topics along with music.

“A lot of our students come from hard homes, and a lot of them don’t really know to play any musical instrument or anything like that,” he said. “They don’t get the opportunities. They don’t get guitar lessons. And the harmonica is a really small instrument that makes it easy for them to take wherever they need it.”

New Bridge students can learn to play the harmonica and make their own instruments. Plus, sometimes it just helps to play the blues.

“The whole idea was to give kids an outlet to deal with issues through music,” Palmer said.

Elementary school teachers from across the district were shown that there are those who care about what they do.

“When you give resources for teachers, amazing things happen,” said RSL owner Dell Loy Hansen.

“It’s good to have people care about what we do and care about the children, and care about our future because that’s why we’re all here,” Palmer said.

School counselor Stephanie Hernandez said some of the $600 for her classroom will go toward snacks.

“So many of these kids don’t have the food that they need, and they come hungry,” said said. “So that puts them at a disadvantage to start their day. So even if we can get them a snack in the morning, that’s great.”

Real Salt Lake’s “Scoring for Schools” program was started in 2018 by Hansen and the RSL Foundation and has so far given over $650,000 to more than 3,000 teachers across Utah.

“Great teachers taking resources (and) empowering kids, and that’s what this program does,” Hansen said. “We’re so excited when we listen to what teachers and counselors can do.”