The Rocky Mountain Elementary School (RMES) in Elkford came in first place with the Indigo Adopt A School competition, taking the grand prize of a $10,000 book fund for the school.
Following a fire in June that destroyed 14,000 books in the school library, an Elkford resident nominated Rocky Mountain Elementary for the contest.
“The contest was supposed to go on for three weeks and we got into it with 11 days remaining,” said Denise Reker, an Elkford mom with children who go to Rocky Mountain.
Reker created a Facebook page to help get the word out through social media.
“All the stay-at-home moms got on the computer and voted all day long,” said Reker.
There were 1460 books purchased for Rocky Mountain directly through the page and 17,603 adopts for the school. For every 50 adopts, the Indigo Love of Reading Foundation gave one book to the school.
“The purchased books equates to $15,768 plus the $10,000 grand prize [that] totals $25,768.01 in Indigo eGift Cards,” said Reker.
Reker said that the support the school received from the community was wonderful.
“We had people [donating] who don’t even live in Elkford, but who care about the school and these kids,” said Reker.
She added, “The real winners in all this are our students. Reading is a skill that will serve them for a lifetime, helping to improve language skills, strengthen creative thinking and uncover hidden talent or interests. With the books received, our aim is to re-stock the library as a core center of learning at RMES and drive the love for reading across our entire studenwt body.”