Blues, Ameren team up for Future Goals program

The St. Louis Blues and long-term partner Ameren have announced a new multi-year initiative to bring *Future Goals™: Hockey Careers Beyond the Ice* program to 30 schools across Missouri and Illinois for the 2025-26 school year.

The newest module of the program launched recently, is a national collaboration between Everfi, the National Hockey League (NHL®), and the National Hockey League Players’ Association (NHLPA). The local initiative featuring the Blues and Ameren is enabling approximately 1,200 students in sixth through ninth grade to learn about future career opportunities within the sport of hockey.

The Future Goals program powered by Everfi is celebrating 12 years of supporting teachers and schools by creating custom online courses that use hockey to make learning engaging and exciting for students. Through the partnership, more than five million students across 10,000 schools in the U.S. and Canada have brought STEM education and career exploration to middle school students. The investment of over $28 million into schools, teachers and students is funded by the NHL and NHLPA’s Industry Growth Fund, a joint initiative with the NHL’s 32-Clubs to support local communities through hockey.

The program’s original interactive digital course, Future Goals: Hockey Scholar, generated millions of hours of learning. Now, Hockey Careers Beyond the Ice shifts the focus from STEM fundamentals to career exploration and readiness, introducing students to the diverse professionals who make professional hockey possible.

Through four 20-minute interactive lessons, students take on real-world challenges across four key areas of professional hockey operations:

• Facilities Operations: Diagnose and solve ice quality issues before game time
• Player Performance: Analyze injuries and develop treatment plans to keep athletes at peak performance
• Fan Engagement: Develop strategies to boost attendance and energize fans through marketing and social media
• Business Intelligence: Ensure financial health by analyzing ticket sales, merchandise revenue, and corporate sponsorships.

“Through a decade of experience with the Future Goals program under the leadership of the NHL and NHLPA, the Blues organization has been proud to provide unique learning experiences for St. Louis area youth,” said Randy Girsch, St. Louis Blues Vice President and Executive Director of Blues For Kids. “The expansion of the program enabled by the generosity of our partners at Ameren will create valuable pathways for hockey-related careers for aspiring students they may have never learned about without this program.”

“At Ameren, we believe in powering possibilities—not just through energy, but by investing in the future of our communities,” said Mark Lindgren, executive vice president for Ameren. “This partnership with the St. Louis Blues gives local students a unique opportunity to explore exciting careers beyond the ice, while building skills that will serve them for a lifetime. We’re proud to help open doors for the next generation and inspire them to dream big.”

"When students can see the connection between what they're learning in school and real career paths in their community, that changes everything," said Ray Martinez, CEO of Everfi. "We're proud to work with the St. Louis Blues and Ameren to bring those opportunities into focus for students across St. Louis—showing them pathways they may not have considered before.”

Aligned with the National Career Clusters® Framework, Common Career Technical Core (CCTC) Career Ready Practices, and Canadian Provincial Curriculum expectations, Hockey Careers Beyond the Ice is available to teachers in the U.S. and Canada at no cost. The course includes implementation guides, offline learning resources, student discussion prompts, and built-in pre- and post-lesson assessments with automatic grading to help educators track student learning gains. If you’re interested in bringing Future Goals: Hockey Careers Beyond the Ice to your school or district, please visit https://futuregoals.nhl.com/.

About Ameren

St. Louis-based Ameren Corporation powers the quality of life for 2.5 million electric customers and more than 900,000 natural gas customers in a 64,000-square-mile area through its Ameren Missouri and Ameren Illinois rate-regulated utility subsidiaries. Ameren Illinois provides electric transmission and distribution service and natural gas distribution service. Ameren Missouri provides electric generation, transmission and distribution services, as well as natural gas distribution service. Ameren Transmission Company of Illinois develops, owns and operates rate-regulated regional electric transmission projects in the Midcontinent Independent System Operator, Inc. For more information, visit Ameren.com, or follow us at @AmerenCorp, Facebook.com/AmerenCorp, or LinkedIn.com/company/Ameren. 

About Everfi

Since 2008, Everfi has connected businesses to communities by providing essential education that builds trust and drives measurable impact. Using digital and offline resources, the company delivers personal finance and life skills education to millions of learners annually in both K-12 schools and broader communities. Today, hundreds of organizations, including financial institutions, professional sports leagues, and healthcare systems, rely on Everfi to deliver measurable outcomes that benefit learners and drive business impact. To learn more about Everfi, please visit everfi.com or follow us on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, or X/Twitter @Everfi.