Books from Birth and the Imagination Library

I had dinner after today’s part of the conference with the duck lady from Tennessee. The duck lady rocks. Tennessee rocks. You are not going to believe what Tennessee does.

Tennessee sends a book every month to every child registered for the program in the state, from birth to age 5. Different books, so if there are siblings they are getting different books as they grow up. When each child turns five they get a congratulations letter along with their final book, and an application to get a library card. All of the books are theirs to keep. Participation state-wide is about 65%. Unfortunately, more affluent families are less likely to apply.

I would type all that two or three more times because I made the duck lady repeat the whole story that many times while I asked her questions, but you probably don’t need that kind of reinforcement.

The program started with Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library. She began doing this in her home county in 1996.  Since then its spread across the state with help from local groups and state and local government. The governor has picked it up for the whole state and calls it Books from Birth.

Wow.