Group awarded $61,000 for books
By Phyllis Moore
Published in News on October 23, 2017 5:50 AM
The Wayne County Partnership for Children is slated to receive $61,000 in funding to provide books for young children over the next two years.
Funding is being provided through the N.C. General Assembly. During the 2017 legislative session, state lawmakers included $3.5 million in the first year of the budget and $7 million in the second year for the Smart Start network to offer free books to children around the state through Dolly Parton's Imagination Library.
Imagination Library was created to foster a love of reading among children from birth to age 5, by providing the gift of a specially chosen book delivered to their home each month. It was founded by Parton to support young children through literacy efforts.
The Wayne Partnership will coordinate the initiative locally, executive director Charlie Ivey said.
"It has received 2,000 slots for the first year of the program," he said. "Over $50,000 worth of books can be distributed under the program in the county during the first year. The remaining funds will be used to coordinate, publicize and enroll children in the program."
Smart Start works in every community to ensure young children have a strong foundation for starting kindergarten, said Cindy Watkins, president of the N.C. Partnership for Children, which oversees the Smart Start network.
"We are tremendously excited about the Imagination Library coming to Wayne County," Ivey said. "Putting books into the hands of young children is a major objective of our organization.
"The program will complement and supplement several other early literacy initiatives already going on locally, including the READ Wayne program at the public library, Goldsboro Pediatrics' Reach Out and Read program, WAGES' Head Start and Early Head Start, as well as the Partnership's own N.C. Pre-Kindergarten program."
All of those programs are aimed at better preparing children for kindergarten and formal education, he said, with the Partnership working with the other agencies to serve the youngest segment of the population in Wayne County.
A formal celebration of the latest funding will be included during the Partnership's annual meeting on Nov. 16.
Once the local agency has procedures in place, Ivey said parents will be able to enroll their children in the rollout program.
He invited parents to be on the lookout for enrollment information in the coming weeks through the media as well as the Partnership's Facebook page and website, www.pfcw.org.
The statewide effort will begin in 98 of the state's 100 counties. It will be offered by zip code, with the initial launch covering 85 percent of the ZIP codes, expanding to every county in the second year.
For more information and to check availability and register a child, visit http://www.smartstart.org/dolly-partons-imagination-library/.