Boise Southwest Rotary Club distributes dictionaries
Three hundred students at local schools are proud owners of new dictionaries thanks to the Boise Southwest Rotary Club. Recently, members of the Rotary Club gave away more than 300 dictionaries to third grade students at Hawthorne, Grace Jordan and Morley Nelson, Lowell and Sacred Heart elementary schools and special education students at West Junior High School. The books were specifically produced for students at the third grade level, when dictionary skills are typically introduced. Students are encouraged to use the books at school or take them home.
During this school year, Rotarians, other service groups and individuals donated more than 11,000 dictionaries to children throughout Idaho. Nationwide, more than 9 million dictionaries have been distributed via The Dictionary Project, a literacy project intended to encourage students to read while providing each child with a book of their own to take home.
Rotary is a worldwide organization of business and professional leaders that provides humanitarian service, encourages high ethical standards in all vocations and helps build goodwill and peace in the world. Approximately 1.2 million Rotarians belong to more than 31,000 Rotary clubs in 167 countries.
Boise Southwest Rotary, which was chartered in 1972, has about 105 members. Club projects include literacy activities and an annual party for Whittier Elementary School students, English language instruction in Thailand, food sorting at the Idaho FoodBank, free dictionaries for third grade students in Boise schools, a Greenbelt clean-up effort, and a campaign to provide food and gift baskets to Mountain States Tumor Institute patients and their families. In 2007, the club also provided funds for Walkin` the Talk youth empowerment training, GPS units for Boise Parks & Recreation programs for people with disabilities, a young authors publishing program at The Cabin, a refugee community garden, Project PATCH, Boys & Girls Club of Garden City, a Boy Scout troop whose members are from Turkey, Russia, and Uzbekistan, and other projects. For more information, see www.boisesouthwestrotary.org.
