Governor to promote Imagination Library at June 12 Scrapper's game
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine and First Lady Fran DeWine will be attending the Sunday, June 12 Mahoning Valley Scrappers baseball game and promoting enrollment into the Ohio Governor’s Imagination Library before the game.
Before the game, the Governor and First Lady will talk about the importance of early childhood literacy at the Imagination Library enrollment table, set up by the Imagination Library’s local affiliate, the United Way of Trumbull County.
Additionally, the DeWines will participate in an Imagination Library graduation ceremony – for five-year-olds who just completed the program – on the field before the first pitch.
This month, 4,346 children in Trumbull County will receive an Imagination Library book, which equals 37% of eligible kids – from birth to age five – within the county. Statewide, 45 percent of Ohio’s eligible children are enrolled, which means 324,887 will receive a book in June.
The Ohio Governor’s Imagination Library mails kids one age-appropriate book each month to children until their 5th birthday. All kids in Ohio are eligible to be enrolled in the program at no cost to their family, thanks to state funding and local county matching funding.
To enroll your youngster, click here.
Also on Friday, Gov. DeWine and the Ohio Department of Natural Resources announced the state is offering $50,000 in grants for new or improved Storybook Trails throughout the state. Storybook Trails work in conjunction with the governor's Imagination Library and Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library to provide story content for several of the trails and to raise awareness of these resources for Ohio families.
Funding for the program will come from the Recreational Trail Program. Cities, villages, townships are eligible to apply for individual grants of $5,000 to $10,000. Applicants must own the property and use the funding for Storybook Trail construction or maintenance, or signage.
Applications for Storybook Trails through the Recreational Trails Program must be postmarked by July 15, 2022. More information on the application and approval process can be found on ODNR's website.
There are 16 ODNR Storybook Trails at state parks throughout the state, and five additional Storybook Trails are expected to open this year. Each Storybook Trail is approximately a half-mile long with 16 child-height panels featuring pages of a children’s book and an activity to accompany the text on the page.
An interactive map of ODNR's Storybook Trails, as well as similar trails located at parks and library districts across the state, can be found at ohiodnr.gov.
