The Dollywood Foundation

The Dollywood Foundation is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded in 1988 by Dolly Parton to inspire the children in her home county to achieve educational success. Initial efforts focused on decreasing the dropout rate in the county's high school.

In the early 1990's, Dolly promised every 7th and 8th-grade student $500 if they successfully graduated from high school. This effort, called The Buddy Program, reduced the dropout rate for these two classes from 35% to 6%.

More importantly, the program catalyzed the community to provide additional resources to sustain this improvement. Currently each year five high school students in Sevier County, receive a $15,000.00 Dolly Parton Scholarship fund.

This local program's success was the impetus of what is now the flagship program of The Foundation, Dolly Parton's Imagination Library. This monthly book gifting program for children under five focuses on inspiring a love of books and reading .