Albert May of Christian Community Action sent in this release and photo about a Rotary Club dictionary giveaway:
The Rotary Club of New Haven today kicked off its annual distribution of dictionaries to all New Haven third-graders with a presentation to School Superintendent Dr. Reginald Mayo, other school officials and third graders at Truman School in New Haven.
“We are extremely grateful to Dr. Mayo and everyone in the New Haven school system who have welcomed this project and assisted us in making it possible over the past six years,” noted Club President Sharon Sudusky. “Our greatest joy comes from seeing the smiles on the children’s faces as they receive the books and receiving thank-you notes afterwards.”
The project began in 2004 as part of the New Haven club’s observance of the 100th birthday of Rotary International. The project is meant to highlight Rotary’s global commitment to literacy. Depending on the size of a particular year’s third-grade class, between 1,500 and 1,800 dictionaries are distributed citywide. They include both English versions and Spanish-English ones to students who are bilingual.
Most of the costs of the project are underwritten by LAZ Parking, which annually donates the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade profits at two of its garages in New Haven to the campaign. Additional support comes from Star Supply, which houses the dictionaries in its warehouse in New Haven until the distribution takes place.
The distribution is handled by individual members of the club, each of whom is assigned specific schools to contact.
Rotary International is a global association of clubs composed of business and professional people, whose mission is to promote service to others, high ethical standards and advance world understanding, goodwill and peace. There are more than 30,000 Rotary Clubs in some 160 countries and more than 1.2 million Rotarians worldwide. Rotary holds a permanent observer seat at the United Nations and a leader in the fight to eliminate polio throughout the world.
Related information and resources are available from the Literacy Coalition of Greater New Haven and its new website at:
http://www.literacyeveryday.org
See that site for details on a January 12 Literacy Forum and website launch event at the Wilson branch of the New Haven Free Public
Library. All are invited.
RSVP: [email protected]