Apollo High School social studies teacher and head football coach, Justin Skaalerud, strives to educate his players on the importance of giving back to the community. It is this effort that has instilled in his players a sense of responsibility. These athletes not only value being successful on the field and in the classroom, but also in the community. Coach Skaalerud has created opportunities for his players to work food drives, support walk-a-thons and provide trash clean-up at community events, just to name a few.
Recently, on February 23, Coach Skaalerud accompanied 40 of his varsity football players to Kennedy, Madison, Westwood and Discovery elementary schools- the very schools that these football players attended as elementary students. In honor of “I Love to Read” month, Coach Skaalerud and his players read to over 1,000 PK-2 students in 49 classrooms.
“When you are a kid, you look up to the varsity players and you want to be like them,” said Luke Dunsmoor, sophmore. “This is an opportunity to go back to where you started.”
While describing her child’s excitement, Kim Eastin, a parent at Madison quoted her 2nd grader, “Mommy guess what! A REAL live football player came to our class today and read to us”.
The experience that Kim’s student and the other PK-2 students had will no doubt leave a lasting positive impression. Thank you to Coach Skaalerud’s coaching team and the Apollo Varsity Football team for demonstrating what it means to make a difference, one player at a time.
