Wells Mountain Foundation, Inc

Literacy

Imagination Library

Reading regularly with children during the preschool years is the biggest boost toward a successful education they will ever get. There may be many reasons why parents don’t read to their children, but WMF is helping to eliminate one of them – a lack of books in the home. In the fall of 2007, the Wells Mountain Foundation, in affiliation with Addison County Readers, launched the Dollywood Foundation’s Imagination Library program in Addison County, Vermont. Any child from birth to age five living in Addison County is eligible to be registered in the program. Each month, an age appropriate book is mailed to the child’s home until he or she turns five. There is no cost to the parent for registration or for the books. All the expenses of the program are paid for via donations from civic organizations and non-profit foundations, like WMF. There are over 1400 children under five living in Addison County. Within four years, we hope to have 80% of the children receiving books monthly. This program is a wonderful way to increase literacy skills and create life-long readers.

Book Angels

The Book Angel program began ten years ago at Deerleap Books in Bristol, Vermont. The name of each “angel” is supplied to us by a social service agency. We receive the name, sex and interest of a young person. A book is selected for each child, wrapped and delivered to that child by the agency. In the first year, we provided gift books for 14 Headstart students. Over the years, the program has grown significantly. We provided over 500 books in 2006. When Deerleap Books closed at the end of 2006, the Book Angel program became part of WMF. With the establishment of the Imagination Library in Addison County, Book Angels now focuses on children and young adults, aged 5 to 18. Former recipients of Book Angel books who are under five years old will now be enrolled in the Imagination Library program.

We give books…

To support literacy, we donate books (at cost or free) to numerous organizations that work with children and young adults. These recipients include the YMCA in Haiti, Addison County Back to School Shop, Children’s Aid and Family Services in Bergen County, New Jersey, the Tari Shattuck Foundation, and a fourth grade class in Santa Fe, New Mexico. If you know of a group that would appreciate a donation of books, please let us know.