In a move that integrates Dolly Parton’s passion for literacy with official state processes, Ohio’s First Lady Fran DeWine announced a strategy to automatically offer enrollment into the Imagination Library as part of newborns’ birth certificate paperwork, during a luncheon on Friday, WBNS reports. This program aims to reach children from the outset of their lives, underlining the critical nature of their earliest years, a period when “80% of a child’s brain is developed by age three,” as First Lady Fran DeWine emphasizes.
Sign-ups previously left to parental initiative, the new procedure simplifies the path to a personal library, offering a collection of 60 books delivered over five years and the change, which ensures that the program’s proven benefits are as accessible as the first breaths of life, with studies showing that participants engage more with their caregivers and enter school better prepared for learning compared to those who don’t partake, as reported by FOX28.
Launching the philanthropic effort at the First Lady’s Luncheon, which also featured Gov. Mike DeWine and a performance by country musician Zac Brown, the initiative saw a blend of governance and artistry, with Brown auctioning a signed guitar to support. Representing 70% of Ohio households with children under five, enrollment numbers have swelled to over 404,000, indicating the breadth of Imagination Library’s impact since it went statewide in 2019, according to details furnished by Spectrum News1…