A letter from Bob Schmidt, Dictionary Project Chair
18 September 2014
Dear Rotarians:
You received a letter last month outlining request for funds to underwrite the dictionary project. If you’re not familiar with it, we distribute annually Spanish/English – English/Spanish dictionaries (paperback) to the third graders in all six elementary schools in the Norristown Area School District.
The latest enrollment figures show that we will be passing out over 700 of these books to the students. The books are ordered from the “Dictionary Project” in North Carolina. Rotary Clubs as well as other organizations have a long-standing relationship with this group. The cost for each book is $2.50.
We reported today to the Board and to the general meeting that, to date, club members have contributed $1320.00 to this project. We are profoundly grateful to each member who has contributed.
The total cost is estimated to be $1860.00. I also emphasized that we were asked to approach club members for donations with the understanding that any balance would be covered by the club using funds reserved for community projects. The fund raising effort was simply to free club funds to be used elsewhere if not needed for this.
The Board agreed that we would accept donations to this project until 30 September. You can bring your donation to the meeting next week or send it to Guido Martinelli. Checks may be made out to the Montgomery Foundation and designated to the “dictionary fund” to receive a tax deduction.
We are ramping up the distribution of dictionaries in each of the schools. To date, we have scheduled four schools, the first one being the Marshall Street School tomorrow morning. Members signed up to volunteer today during our meeting. If you want to add your name to one or more of these events, go to the Rotary Club website where you can do this online, thanks to our computer guru, Mark Call. You can also call me to add your name.
Again, I want to express my deep appreciation to each of you for your interest in this literacy project in Norristown.
Bob Schmidt