Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library

This program is open to all children who reside either full-time or part-time at an address within Oklahoma County (aside from Luther and Jones which are covered through another community affiliate. Just click on the name of your community to get registered with that program. ). Children must be 4 years and 11 months old or younger to qualify. Any child older than 4 years and 11 months at the time of registration is not eligible for the program.

There is no cost to families for enrolled children, although donations are always welcomed.

The fastest option is to fill out this online form, or if you’d prefer you can mail in a paper form to register, however it does take longer to manually process.

No. Registration is ongoing. However, please keep in mind that only children ages birth to 4 years and 11 months old are eligible to receive books. If your child is older than 4 years and 11 months at the time of registration, they will not be eligible for the program.

Children will receive books that are appropriate for their age. They are selected by professionals who choose books that reflect a diversity of people and cultures, and that promote self-esteem and a love of reading.

Each year, the esteemed Blue Ribbon Book Selection Committee, a specially selected panel of early childhood literacy experts, is responsible for reviewing hundreds of potential titles for inclusion in Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library national. The Blue Ribbon Book Selection Committee is a part of the Dollywood Foundation in Tennessee and takes great care in choosing books that meet the different needs of children as they progress from birth to age five. This committee select books for all national and international affiliates. All books are published by Penguin Random House. For more information, please visit the Imagination Library’s site.

Thanks to a collaborative effort between Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, American Printing House for the Blind (APH), and Penguin Group, USA, an ever-expanding collection of titles will be available as free downloadable children’s audio books and for those who prefer, there will be many titles available in braille from APH. These will be offered free-of-charge to eligible families and may be purchased at a low cost by all others. For more information, please click here.

Yes, the program provides two titles of bilingual (English/Spanish) books per year and are always looking to expand their selection. Unfortunately, there is no option to receive all books as bilingual at this time or to receive bilingual books in languages other than English/Spanish.

Yes!

After registering it can take approximately 9 weeks before the first book will arrive. Books are mailed in groups based on birth year. While each enrolled child in your household will get a new book every month, the books may not arrive on the same day for children of different ages.

The Dollywood Foundation currently does not send out or provide shipment notifications or tracking information. As these books are mailed through the United States Postal Service, you can sign up for their free Informed Delivery program where they will email you a daily preview of your upcoming mail and packages. It is a very helpful and free tool.  Click here for more information or to sign up.

After you register your child, it may take up to 9 weeks for the first book to arrive. After that, the books will arrive every month. However, books can arrive at any time in the month, and children in the same household may not receive their books on the same day.

Regardless of the number of eligible children in your household, every enrolled eligible child will receive their own personalized book each month.

Each child within an age group receives the same monthly book. Imagination Library makes sure children receive an appropriate book by allocating them to an age group based on their year of birth.

The Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library Book Selection Committee rotates approximately 25% of titles for each age group each year. So, yes, your younger child will receive some of the same books their older sibling received.

• Start by submitting the online registration form, or print and submit the paper form.
• To take part in our local program, you must be a legal resident of Oklahoma County (aside from Luther and Jones which are covered through another community affiliate. Just click on the name of your community to get registered with that program.).
• If your child’s address changes, you must update your family’s information in the Parent Information Center in order to continue receiving books in the mail. 
• When your child receives their books, spend time reading together. Visit the Parent Resources page for more ideas and suggestions.

If you move, please log into your account to change the primary address you have listed in your account. Depending on where you move you may be transferred to another affiliate’s program, or you may be dropped from the program as the community you moved to does not have a program yet. Log into your account to check for availability at your new address.

Upon turning 5 years of age, your child will stop receiving a monthly book. In addition, if your child moves to an address outside of the Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library for Oklahoma County’s service area, they will no longer be eligible to receive books from this program.

No, because we will need to know the exact birth date of your child (to ensure age-appropriate books), it is important to wait until after your child is born to enroll them in the program.

If your child is too old or does not live in our service area, there are still plenty of ways that you can use the Metropolitan Library System of Oklahoma County to help your child become a better and more active reader. The Library has programming and story times for children of all ages. Visit our events calendar to find programming for your child or children. Also, the Library does have accounts available for those who live outside our service area. Click here to learn more about those accounts. 

If you believe you should be eligible based on your address, but you are having trouble registering, please email us and provide your mailing address so we can check your eligibility and make adjustments to our system as we roll out this service.

No. You must be the child’s parent or legal guardian to register them for this program.

If you provide an email address with your registration you will be notified via email when the registration is approved. Please keep in mind that it does take 6 – 9 weeks for books to start arriving after approval.  

We use the survey to gather information to share with our funders so they can see the program impact and the importance of the Imagination Library in our community.

All books will be delivered to the address you provided us at registration by the U.S. Postal Service. If you believe that you are having issues with your delivery, please confirm that you have the correct address listed in your account information and then contact the post office closest to your mailing address. 

The Library is not responsible for lost or stolen packages. The books are processed through Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, the Metropolitan Library System of Oklahoma County has no control over this process.

Books are mailed in groups based on birth year. While each enrolled child in your household will get a new book every month, the books may not arrive on the same day for children of different ages.

If an email address was added to your child’s record upon registration, this will serve as your username. If you do not know your password, please request a new password using the New Password/Forgot Password link on the login page. If you require further assistance, please contact our Imagination Library team via email.

If your child did not receive their book this month, it could be for one of several reasons.

• Some of the books have hardcovers and may not fit into your mailbox. If this is the case, the post office might put a yellow package slip into your box and hold your book for you to pick up at the postal service desk.
• If you have recently moved and didn’t update your address in the system. The post office will not forward your books.
  • If you did not notify us of an address change, your child may have been unenrolled from the program. Please login to your account to check or contact our office. You may need to re-enroll them.
• If you have recently submitted your registration, it takes approximately 9 weeks from enrollment for your child to receive their first book.
• If you have recently registered, your child may be placed on a waiting list.

Make sure your account and mailing address are up to date by going to the login page and verifying your information. If you are unable to resolve your issue contact our Imagination Library team via email.

If you no longer want to receive books, you can log into your account and select to discontinue your book delivery at any time.

Books will be returned to us at full postage cost or the post office will simply throw them away. If we are able to get them back from the post office, we will attempt to contact you. If we do not hear from you, we will have to remove your child from the program and the books will be given to the Library for community distribution.

Click here to make sure your address is correct.

Donations to our local Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library program can be made through the Friends of the Library.

We would be happy to speak to your organization about Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, please send us an email or give us a call at 405-606-3760.

You can also click here to visit our Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library Caregiver Toolkit page where you can download and print different resources or copy email templates.