In 1990, the town’s high school dropout rate was 54% – one of the highest in the country.
Dolly was born in Sevierville and unlike other megastars, she never forgot where she came from.
So here’s what she did.
One year, she invited all fifth and sixth graders to Dollywood.
She told them to pick a buddy, and then made them a deal: If both of them graduated, they would each get $500 on their graduation day.
After a few years, the dropout rate fell – but Dolly wanted to do more.
Dolly learned the reason kids were dropping out of high school was because they didn’t get enough academic support when they were younger. So Dolly personally paid for teaching assistants for every first grade class for the next two years.
It worked — but she wanted to do more.
Dolly saw that children from low-income families started school at a big disadvantage, because they couldn’t read at the same level as other kids.
So she quietly started giving out free books.
She even gave it a special name.
She called it the Imagination Library.
Every month, every child in Sevier County would get a free book mailed to them – no strings attached.
It started from the time a child was born and continued until they reached kindergarten.
And it worked.
It was so successful that Dolly began expanding the program.
Before long, other states were asking for books — and Dolly kept sending them.
Eventually it expanded to Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom.
Tens of thousands of children were learning to read thanks to Dolly.
In 2018, she donated her 100 millionth book to the Library of Congress.
It’s titled “A Coat of Many Colors.”
Dolly dedicated it to her father, who never had the opportunity to go to school but always encouraged her to follow her dreams.
Today, Dolly’s Imagination Library has mailed out more than 193 million free books to children all over the world. Nearly 2 million children are registered.
Think about that for a second.
There are entire generations of children who learned to read thanks to Dolly.
Today, if you go to her website, you’ll see a letter written by Dolly.
She says despite all her achievements, the most important thing she’s done is to help kids to read.
It ends with these words.
“The first step is always the hardest, but you’ll never know unless you try.”
At Goodable, we believe every kid should have positivity in their classroom. That’s why we launched Goodable in the Classroom – a free resource for every educator that includes uplifting stories, printable worksheets, and class discussions.
Did you know that a Canadian helped create the modern day US Special Forces?
He was Indigenous, a war hero, and a survivor of Canada’s residential school system.
This is the story of the most badass war hero you’ve never heard of.
A Goodable Thread. 🧵
This is Tommy Prince.
As a child in Manotiba, he was forced into a residential school, a government system designed to brutally strip away all Indigenous culture and history.
Prince survived and when WW2 began, he decided to enlist in the army.
The army rejected Tommy several times, but he refused to give up.
In 1940, they finally let him in.
As a soldier, the army quickly realized Tommy had a special skill. It was really, really badass.
On this day, a tiny town in Canada opened up their hearts — and their homes — to 7,000 stranded passengers in their time of need.
They didn’t care about politics, or who the President was.
They did it because it's what Canadians do.
Here's how they did it.
A Goodable Thread🧵
On the east coast of North America, there's a Canadian province called Newfoundland. It’s filled with cold winters, warm summers, and even warmer hearts.
The province has a small town called Gander.
In the 1940s, its airport used to be one of the biggest in the world.
On September 11, 2001, it started out as a normal day.
People dropped off their kids, went to work, chatted with friends. The kind of things that happen everyday in small towns across Canada.