Jennifer Yauck has a goal to raise awareness for the Dolly Parton Imagination Library in hopes the county’s partnership with the library will sustain and grow registration numbers.
“We’ve slowed down pushing new registrations simply because we’re making sure that we can sustain the current number we have,” she said. “We’re probably about ($6,000) to $7,000 away from funding the current 418 children.”
Yauck, who is the coordinator of the Oglethorpe County chapter of Delta Kappa Gamma Society International and teaches at Oglethorpe County High School, said the Gamma Tau chapter was given three renewable Elise Boylston Grants, with the last one of $4,700 coming in May.
“That’s one thing we’re really trying to push right now,” she said. “We’re now (in our) fourth year (of fundraising), so that means our grant money is no longer available. We are now totally dependent on the donations of local individuals and businesses to continue to sponsor the program.”
Thanks to a partnership with the Oglethorpe County School System in 2020 and the renewable grants, the chapter has donated funds to the Nashville-based library to mail books to children from birth to age 5.
The chapter also used other grants of $2,500 and $2,000 and consistently had enough money to cover the monthly mailing and book costs, totaling roughly $2.60 for each child’s monthly book, which is more than $10,000 annually.
“The school system (was) eager to bring this program to the children in our county because it is (very low-cost),” she said. “But it’s also just so important because literacy just feeds into so many other dynamics, that having a program like that early on, we wanted Oglethorpe County to have those benefits.”
To help raise awareness and funding, Yauck said the chapter gives presentations to local organizations, like the Rotary Club, holds an annual stakeholders meeting where people can see how much has been donated and writes letters to local businesses.
Lexington Primary Care is a sponsor for the 2025-26 school year and recently made a $500 donation that will make it possible for 20 children to receive monthly books for one year.
“We like to get as many donors as we possibly can because it’s up to a county once they are enrolled in the (library),” said Judith Lance, a member of the Gamma Tau chapter. “That’s what we try to do, is maintain the donations, because that’s what we survive on.”
Yauck said the Imagination Library has a panel of experts in children’s literature to select and mail age appropriate books to the children and the county’s local Delta Kappa Gamma Society International chapter helps solicit registrations for local families with eligible children.
She added that the panel will look for books that are “well known,” ones children will interact with and others focused on kindness.
“One of the goals of the library is to foster a positive interaction between caregivers and their children as they’re reading these books,” she said. “It’s not just reading the words on the page and you’re done.”
She said the library places various reading strategies inside the cover of the books, from advising parents to ask their children questions about the books and asking children to make predictions about what may happen next.
“Books offer an opportunity for parents to read to their children orally,” Lance said. “With books, to develop a love for reading, you need that contact. When I have parents talk to me about the books that they received, they are happy about them, and eventually, children are as well.”
For Yauck, giving a child a book is the “first step” in helping children have positive interactions with books.
“I’ve heard many, many times that their child enjoys receiving a book each month,” she said. “And also, (parents and caregivers have) enjoyed reading the books to the children. We know that those interactions, for a variety of reasons, help to foster a love of reading (for children) when they enter school.”