Dictionaries for Schools

The RCNA provided Spanish/English, English, and Chinese/English dictionaries for two schools, Hightower Elementary and Cary Reynolds Elementary, both located in Doraville. These schools are Title 1 schools with a high percentage of students qualify for the "free lunch" program.

All 3rd graders at Cary Reynolds received dictionaries while at Hightower all 3rd and 4th graders benefited. Rotarians made presentations to teachers & students, distributing the dictionaries and reciting the Rotary Four-Way Test. Inside the front page of each dictionary, a Rotary Four-Way Test label is affixed, providing PR and promotion of Rotary ideals. The students are asked to write about how the Four-Way test is exemplified in their lives. The essays are shared with the Rotary Club at our meetings.

We are asked to provide Spanish/English and Chinese/English, as well as English dictionaries for these populations; English is a second language for a very high percentage of students in both schools. These dictionaries serve a need that would otherwise not be met and will often be one of the only books a student will be able to call their own.

This project is ongoing and has been supported by North Atlanta Rotary for many years. It is sustainable and needed, and directly impacts individual students, their teachers and literacy within our community -- for at least one generation, and often the whole family of the student.