Let no child get through first grade without receiving a library card.

That’s the goal of the Selma-Dallas County Public Library in cooperation with area schools.

A September offensive will continue throughout the school year with the purpose of connecting the library with every first-grader in Dallas County – public, private and home-school groups.

The plan is to get every first grader in every school in Dallas County to the library sometime during the year to get a tour plus entertainment, to get a card, to receive a packet of materials to take home and, it is hoped, to continue to use the information services provided by the library on a regular basis thereafter.

Representatives of the three principal partners recently gathered at the library to make the announcement and to spell out details of how it will work.

Becky Nichols, librarian, joined

Gwen Carrington, reading coordinator for the Dallas County School System, and Mary Lane Peel, a reading coach and an elementary teacher in the Selma City Schools, in the children’s area of the library to talk about the plan.

Cooperating are the library, the Selma City Schools and the Dallas County School System which are providing bus transportation from their respective schools to the library. Also included in the plan are first graders in private schools and home-school groups.

“The aim is to create an alliance between the library, the school and the home,” said Nichols.

“This is a first for the state of Alabama, to bring these three together as partners, to enhance the efforts each is making to nurture our children,” she said.

For five years the library has had a program in place to get library cards into the hands of first-graders, but in Nichols’ opinion there have been too many barriers and since the program was based on awards given to the first class to reach 100 percent participation in each school, that left a lot of people out.

Additionally, Nichols said, it’s too difficult for many to get to the library – especially

those living in remote areas of Dallas County.

“We were only getting to a percentage of the first graders. Now we believe through this new joint effort we can reach them all with the help of the schools and parents,” Nichols said. “Library, teachers, parents can now work together to provide the best resources available to teach our children to read at a very early age and to use fully this wonderful resource (the library) that belongs to the community.”

Carrington described the successful effort in Dallas County School System to receive an Alabama Reading First grant (ARFI) to enable the system to select and obtain a scientific, research-based program to teach children to read at the earliest possible level.

Peel said that the city school system has the same grant and the same types of programs to teach the fundamentals of reading through the federal and state-funded program.

Carrington described the Alabama Reading First program as cutting to the core issues related to learning to read. The focus is on five areas of need and five strategies to meet them based on the best scientific, educational research available. Involved are reading coaches and small groups which allow for individualized instruction. Parents are brought into play as support partners in the process where possible, so what is taught in the school is reinforced at home.

Both Carrington and Peel noted that there is much movement between city and county schools by students as families change location in the community.

The fact that both Dallas County and Selma educators have gone to the same meetings, and are operating using the same philosophy and techniques is a real plus, they said.

Add the library which is available to all and you have a wonderful possibility for creating the seamless web in teaching youngsters to read, Nichols reiterated.

Nichols calls it the triangle – library, schools/teachers and home/parent(s).

She described the way the program will work.

Through agreements with the city and county schools, buses will bring the first-graders to the library during the school day on a staggered schedule throughout the school year.

At the library children will receive a tour, a library card and other materials, including educational and health tips, to take home to share with their family.

“Quite simply, our purpose is selling them (the first graders) on coming back, and we need their teachers’ and parents’ support to do that,” she said.

“The program is being supported by the library’s centennial fund,” Nichols said.

“While the children are here for their visit, they will see a puppet show, do a craft which will involve making a necklace on which they can wear their new card around their neck,” she said.