United Way Of Southern Kentucky Inc

Kindergarten readiness:in order to ensure children have the skills needed to enter kindergarten ready to learn, united way continued the kindergarten readiness campaign that started in 2016/17 to help educate parents about how to better prepare their children for day one of kindergarten. As part of this effort, united way encourages parents to read, play, count, and log off with their children. Parents can log onto the united way microsite mychildisready.com to find information to determine if their child is kindergarten ready and if not, how they can adapt everyday activities to increase the level of their child's readiness. Another critical component in united way's work in early childhood education is the expansion of an additional born learning trail, and united way continues to expand its efforts to enroll eligible children in the dolly parton imagination library program. Since united way began the management and facilitation of the program in 2011, more than 798,368 books have been distributed; between july 2024 and june 2025 a total of 108,835 books were distributed.

Southern kentucky 2-1-1:in july 2024 southern kentucky 2-1-1 completed its ninth year of information and referral services to the residents of the allen, barren, butler, edmonson, hart, logan, metcalfe, monroe, simpson and warren counties. In january 2021 text services became available, adding another way those in need could reach out to 2-1-1. In fy2025, southern kentucky 2-1-1 provided more than 9,421 contacts with information about utility assistance, food pantries, rent assistance, emergency shelter, childcare, employment, transportation, and clothing, and more. Contacts via telephone or text are answered 24/7/365, and our online public search about available services can be accessed through www.navigateresources.net/uwsk/. In january 2025, southern kentucky 2-1-1 became the service provider for the central kentucky counties of hardin, breckenridge, grayson, larue, and meade. The opening of southern kentucky 2-1-1 in july 2016 made information about community services available to more than 60% of kentuckians, and in 2021, 2-1-1 services became available state-wide. Since opening, a total of 68,693 contacts have come into the center.

Uwsk coordinates many direct impact services to our communities. In the 2024/25 fiscal year $122,265 was distributed to area organizations in flexible support grants for one-time requests that are outside of our annual fund distribution process. Additionally united way held annual feed the need food drive and day of caring events, and worked to continue public awareness of the importance of early childhood education.