Sitting hunched over her dining room table, licking stamps and stuffing children's books she paid for into padded envelopes, Madison's Robyn Ferst never doubted that her charity would be big.
"She's the ultimate visionary," says Shauna von Hanstein, Ferst Foundation for Childhood Literacy's director of operations.
Going from soliciting kid readers at local festivals and the supermarket to sponsored programs in 73 counties of the state and joining Dolly Parton's Imagination Library in forging a partnership with Rotary International is definitely big.
As a child, Ferst had degenerative hearing loss and books gave her a world where being unable to hear didn't matter. She couldn't imagine a house without books.
It impresses me that this charity doesn't sit back waiting for people to ask for help. They actively advertise trying to reach more children. Their goal is to offer a book every month to every child under five in every county of Georgia.
They're motivated by the thought that having books in the home prepares a child for school and learning success. And they believe a larger group of better readers will someday result in a larger, better-educated workforce.
My youngest and I will be sad on his fifth birthday this winter when the books stop coming. But we have a huge library of well-read, well-loved stories that have him well on the way to reading himself.
Ferst Foundation for Childhood Literacy
P.O. Box 1327
Madison, GA 30650
www.ferstfoundation.org
706-343-0177
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