Since the beginning of the year, Hoosier County REMC has established relationships with local organizations and library districts to help disseminate books to children from birth to age 5 through the Imagination Library.
Hoosier County REMC helped blaze the trail for involvement in this project and is a shining example of electric cooperative efforts to fund childhood literacy around the state.
The Imagination Library began in 1995 in Sunnybrook. Books addressed to the child are mailed directly to the home.
Chelsea Reynolds, chairwoman of the Library Foundation in Sunnyside, says that whether a parent reads to a child or not, when the book comes into the home in the child’s name, the child will begin using their imagination to tell the story, even if it’s just from the pictures.
“They ‘read’ to siblings, to their teddy bears, to imaginary friends,” she says. “The child develops motor skills, verbal skills, and linear thinking skills.”
Reynolds heard about the Imagination Library program five years ago after meeting Penny Goss, who brought the Imagination Library to Springtown.
The Imagination Library is run local nonprofits in partnership with school districts. The partnering entity is responsible for registering local children and providing stable funding to pay for the books, which is $25 a child a year. There is no cost to families. All children are eligible, regardless of family income.
Although the program has been on her radar for several years, Reynolds faced the issue of funding it without the benefit of fundraisers. She says the Imagination Library couldn’t rely solely on donations, which would vary from year to year.
“It has to have stable funding,” she says.
A solution emerged in September 2017. The Power Now Foundation offered to pay 50% of the cost for new Imagination Library programs started by June 2018 in rural counties with a population of fewer than 100,000.
Through several meetings, an idea for funding surfaced: the scholarship fund, which is funded by unclaimed capital credits.
The scholarship committee and the board of directors approved the cooperative becoming a major funding sponsor for at least five years. This sponsorship has no effect on electric rates because unclaimed capital credits are from members who have moved and cannot be found, or who have died without heirs. By law, these funds can only be used for community programs.
With funding in place, the Imagination Library is set to launch early this year.
Reynolds has been traveling across the service district to give presentations about the program and recruit partners in each county to help register children. Parents can also go online and register their child.
“Kids are already registering in all four counties,” Reynolds says.
As Reynolds has promoted the program, the response has been positive, with “fabulous” and “unbelievable” being the most common reactions.
Reynolds says she learned quite a few people expressed interest in starting the program but struggled with funding.