The Noontime Rotary Club in Santa Maria is celebrating the start of the school year by gifting hundreds of dictionaries to third grade students in the Santa Maria Bonita School District.
Members of the Rotary Club delivered the donated books to Jimenez and Miller Schools to give them out to the students within the district. They gave away almost 1,900 dictionaries throughout the 16 elementary schools within the district.
The mission of the Noontime Rotary’s project is to provide dictionaries to every third-grade student in the district without making them pay for the books. The Rotarians carry out the initiative in order to encourage the usefulness of a dictionary beyond its spelling, pronunciations and definitions help. They say it provides the children a source to utilize in problem-solving and self-development.
"We appreciate the Noontime Rotary's commitment to education, literacy and local schools," said SMBSD Superintendent Luke Ontiveros in a press release. "A dictionary is a resource that a student can use anytime, anywhere to satisfy their curiosity and expand their knowledge."
The Noontime Rotary has given dictionaries to students in years past as a part of its Rotary Dictionary Project. The last time they were able to carry out this project was in 2013.
