Eastern Shore Literacy Council Receives Grant From Perdue Foundation

Eastern Shore Literacy Council

29316 Lankford Hwy.,  P.O. Box 228, Melfa, VA  23410

Contact:  Rose Rulon    Phone:  757-789-1761  director.esliteracy@es.vccs.edu



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

January 3, 2022

Eastern Shore Literacy Council Receives Grant

The Eastern Shore Literacy Council was recently awarded a ten-thousand dollar ($10,000.00) grant from the Franklin P. and Arthur W. Perdue Foundation to support the Dolly Parton Imagination Library program.   Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library is a book gifting program that mails new, high-quality, age-appropriate books to children from birth to age five, no matter their family’s income. The program is designed to inspire a love of reading and learning in young children and provided with hopes that adults and children spend hours enjoying special time together. 

The Imagination Library, started in 1995, mails nearly two million books each month to children worldwide.  Local “Champions” are sponsors, acting as administrators, raising funds to cover the costs of mailing and promoting the program. The Eastern Shore Literacy Council became a Dolly Parton Imagination Library affiliate and champion in September 2021.  As an affiliate, the Eastern Shore Literacy Council registers children, pays the wholesale cost of books and mailing, and builds community knowledge about the program. 

An estimated 2,400 children in Accomack and Northampton counties are eligible to receive free books through the Imagination Library.  This grant from the Perdue Foundation will enable the Eastern Shore Literacy Council to continue and expand the program. 

The Perdue Foundation strives to strengthen the communities where Perdue Farms associates live and work by focusing its efforts on education, agriculture, the environment, health and social services, and fighting hunger and poverty.  

The Eastern Shore Literacy Council has been providing adult basic education and English as a Second Language to adults for three and a half decades.   

For more information or to donate to the Eastern Shore Literacy Council call 757-789-1761, email esliteracy@gmail.com or visit www.shoreliteracy.org.  To register a child for the Imagination Library visit www.imaginationlibrary.com or email .