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New Book Goes Toward Funds for Pre-School Scholarship Program

Nina Todea
/
KSMU

A local effort called the Every Child Promise Initiative is trying to raise $100,000 for a permanent scholarship fund to help Springfield kids get quality pre-school. 

Part of the Every Child Promise Initiative includes a new book by Todd Parnell, who is the past president of Drury University and a retired banker.

Parnell joined us in the studio to talk about his book, “Privilege and Privation: A Love Story.”

“It’s a very loosely assembled look at what happens when two young people fall in love from different income backgrounds—and how they come together, and how they try to stay together and how they try to bridge the gaps that they have. And the gaps that their parents have in understanding each other – just looking at the role that education plays in trying to bridge those gaps," Parnell said.

His goal is to raise half of the $100,000 endowment, with the other half coming from private donors, by early 2019. Parnell says the fund shows that the community has made and kept a promise.

Dana Carroll, who serves as Springfield’s Child Advocate for the ECP, says she hopes the fund will address kindergarten readiness as well as workforce development.

“It’s very much like a college scholarship. It certainly has at least as big of an impact, if not more of an impact, on children’s learning – just allowing them the opportunity to choose a high-quality program," Carroll said.

More than 1,000 books have been pre-sold. And in the next 30 days, Carroll and Parnell say they hope to sell another 1,000 books.

You can pre-order “Privilege and Privation: A Love Story” online at www.everychildpromise.org. All proceeds from the book go toward the initiative.