Smart Start

Help your child turn five, ready to thrive! Smart Start of Mecklenburg County supports families to improve early childhood health, education and development, and ensure children are prepared for Kindergarten.

Childcare Resources

Child care resources is a private, non-profit child care resource and referral agency that works with families and communities to help ensure that children have access to high-quality, affordable early learning and school-age opportunities and experiences that enable them to succeed in school and in life. They offer offers parents FREE, personalized referrals to licensed child care providers in Mecklenburg, Cabarrus, Union, Rowan, and Stanly counties.

Read Together CLT

Read Together is a collaborative effort to have more children in Mecklenburg County experience reading together with an adult, which is a simple yet powerful way to help children develop and grow critical literacy skills.

Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library

Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library provides books, free of charge, to children across the country until their 5th birthday. Each child receives one age-appropriate book in the mail each month.

Raising a Reader

Raising A Reader promotes literacy between parents and children by providing rotating bags of high-quality books to children enrolled in childcare centers, and by offering onsite early literacy workshops.

Reach Out and Read

Reach Out and Read gives young children a foundation for success by incorporating books into well-care visits in pediatric offices. and encouraging families to read aloud together. Pediatric doctors, nurse practitioners, and other medical professionals incorporate books into well-care visits and encourage families to read aloud together.

The Basics Mecklenberg

Grounded in research showing that 80% of brain growth happens in the first three years and that skill gaps appear as early as age two, The Basics promotes five simple, science-backed practices that help every child thrive. They work across organizations and sectors so families encounter The Basics everywhere—at home, in clinics, libraries, workplaces, and beyond—making early learning a natural part of daily life.

Meck Pre-K

A Mecklenburg County-funded program that offers a high-quality Pre-K experience to ensure children are prepared for kindergarten. Classrooms are located in 4 and 5-star child care centers and children attend a 6.5 hour school day program.

Parents as Teachers

Parents As Teachers is a voluntary early childhood development home visiting program offering research-based curricula that help families raise children to be healthy, safe, and ready to learn in school.

Y Readers

Y Readers is a six-week summer literacy program for struggling K-3rd grade readers that the YMCA of Greater Charlotte started to prevent summer learning loss and help close the achievement gap. The program builds students’ self-confidence and provides high-quality literacy instruction so that students are proficient in reading by the end of third grade. 

CMS Schools Family Academy

CMS schools offer Family Academy virtual Lunch & Learn sessions and On The Go! in-person sessions to help families support thier children’s success in school. You can also watch past sessions in their On Demand Video Library.

Charlotte Mecklenburg Library

With a FREE CMS Library Card, Mecklenberg County residents and property owners can check out books, e-books, audio books, and all types of streaming content along with getting access to resources and programs, including:

• Hoopla — borrow e-books, comics, audiobooks, music, movies and television with no holds and no waiting! Content can be streamed to computers, tablets, or smartphones, and can be downloaded to mobile devices to allow for offline viewing any time.
• Tumblebook Library —  Access FREE animated storybooks in French and Spanish for language learning, read-along books, non-fiction books, puzzles and games, math stories, and graphic novels that can be read by you or for you!
• Tutor.com — Get free homework help from a live, online, qualified tutor for up to 10 tutoring sessions each week.
• Storytime Events — Most library branches offer storytime events where your family can enjoy stories, songs, and/or activities that support early literacy skill development and help foster a love of books and reading in your child.
• Storywalk — Storywalk is an innovative and interactive way for readers of all ages to enjoy a story and the outdoors at the same time. Laminated pages from a children’s picture book are displayed on special display posts along an outdoor path in a park. As you stroll down the trail, you are directed to the next page in the story. 
• Active Reading Training — Join the library for an hour to learn how to actively read with children and strategies to support literacy at home or in your community.

Smart Start

Help your child turn five, ready to thrive! Smart Start of Mecklenburg County supports families to improve early childhood health, education and development, and ensure children are prepared for Kindergarten.

Childcare Resources

Child care resources is a private, non-profit child care resource and referral agency that works with families and communities to help ensure that children have access to high-quality, affordable early learning and school-age opportunities and experiences that enable them to succeed in school and in life. They offer offers parents FREE, personalized referrals to licensed child care providers in Mecklenburg, Cabarrus, Union, Rowan, and Stanly counties.

Read Together CLT

Read Together is a collaborative effort to have more children in Mecklenburg County experience reading together with an adult, which is a simple yet powerful way to help children develop and grow critical literacy skills.

Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library

Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library provides books, free of charge, to children across the country until their 5th birthday. Each child receives one age-appropriate book in the mail each month.

Raising a Reader

Raising A Reader promotes literacy between parents and children by providing rotating bags of high-quality books to children enrolled in childcare centers, and by offering onsite early literacy workshops.

Reach Out and Read

Reach Out and Read gives young children a foundation for success by incorporating books into well-care visits in pediatric offices. and encouraging families to read aloud together. Pediatric doctors, nurse practitioners, and other medical professionals incorporate books into well-care visits and encourage families to read aloud together.

The Basics Mecklenberg

Grounded in research showing that 80% of brain growth happens in the first three years and that skill gaps appear as early as age two, The Basics promotes five simple, science-backed practices that help every child thrive. They work across organizations and sectors so families encounter The Basics everywhere—at home, in clinics, libraries, workplaces, and beyond—making early learning a natural part of daily life.

Meck Pre-K

A Mecklenburg County-funded program that offers a high-quality Pre-K experience to ensure children are prepared for kindergarten. Classrooms are located in 4 and 5-star child care centers and children attend a 6.5 hour school day program.

Parents as Teachers

Parents As Teachers is a voluntary early childhood development home visiting program offering research-based curricula that help families raise children to be healthy, safe, and ready to learn in school.

Charlotte Mecklenburg Library

With a FREE CMS Library Card, Mecklenberg County residents and property owners can check out books, e-books, audio books, and all types of streaming content along with getting access to resources and programs, including:

• Hoopla — borrow e-books, comics, audiobooks, music, movies and television with no holds and no waiting! Content can be streamed to computers, tablets, or smartphones, and can be downloaded to mobile devices to allow for offline viewing any time.
• Tumblebook Library —  Access FREE animated storybooks in French and Spanish for language learning, read-along books, non-fiction books, puzzles and games, math stories, and graphic novels that can be read by you or for you!
• Storytime Events — Most library branches offer storytime events where your family can enjoy stories, songs, and/or activities that support early literacy skill development and help foster a love of books and reading in your child.
• Storywalk — Storywalk is an innovative and interactive way for readers of all ages to enjoy a story and the outdoors at the same time. Laminated pages from a children’s picture book are displayed on special display posts along an outdoor path in a park. As you stroll down the trail, you are directed to the next page in the story. 
• Active Reading Training — Join the library for an hour to learn how to actively read with children and strategies to support literacy at home or in your community.

Y Readers

Y Readers is a six-week summer literacy program for struggling K-3rd grade readers that the YMCA of Greater Charlotte started to prevent summer learning loss and help close the achievement gap. The program builds students’ self-confidence and provides high-quality literacy instruction so that students are proficient in reading by the end of third grade. 

CMS Schools Family Academy

CMS schools offer Family Academy virtual Lunch & Learn sessions and On The Go! in-person sessions to help families support thier children’s success in school. You can also watch past sessions in their On Demand Video Library.

Charlotte Mecklenburg Library

With a FREE CMS Library Card, Mecklenberg County residents and property owners can check out books, e-books, audio books, and all types of streaming content along with getting access to resources and programs, including:

• Hoopla — borrow e-books, comics, audiobooks, music, movies and television with no holds and no waiting! Content can be streamed to computers, tablets, or smartphones, and can be downloaded to mobile devices to allow for offline viewing any time.
• Tumblebook Library —  Access FREE animated storybooks in French and Spanish for language learning, read-along books, non-fiction books, puzzles and games, math stories, and graphic novels that can be read by you or for you!
• Tutor.com — Get free homework help from a live, online, qualified tutor for up to 10 tutoring sessions each week.
• Storytime Events — Most library branches offer storytime events where your family can enjoy stories, songs, and/or activities that support early literacy skill development and help foster a love of books and reading in your child.
• Storywalk — Storywalk is an innovative and interactive way for readers of all ages to enjoy a story and the outdoors at the same time. Laminated pages from a children’s picture book are displayed on special display posts along an outdoor path in a park. As you stroll down the trail, you are directed to the next page in the story. 
• Active Reading Training — Join the library for an hour to learn how to actively read with children and strategies to support literacy at home or in your community.