Many thanks go out to our volunteers at the Bushtukah warehouse on August 15th who loaded 1,910 dictionaries into the vehicles of 10 participating clubs from District 7040 and 7810. Left, in the warehouse, to be delivered were our club's 480 plus 64 surplus dictionaries and 116 Sackville, NB dictionaries. Our 11 teams of volunteers will deliver them to RCWO's 11 schools by curbside drop off due to Covid-19 again this Fall.
Meet last year's volunteers in this short video (or paste this url in your browser https://youtu.be/KZULLycOLHY) Here are some of this year's volunteers. Video to come that will tell the full story by end of November.
See what a difference one dictionary can make for life! RCWO's 60 second entry to the DGs challenge to tell the story of a club project. http://youtube/uCwcZQKQ6nE
Last Fall, 2021, presentations of books were to over 2,000 Grade 3s in Ottawa, Prescott (Brockville club supported), Cornwall, Smiths Falls, Kingston, Eganville, Montreal-Lakeshore, Arnprior, Fredericton and Sackville, NB. This year 2,136 books arrived this summer from Dubai, without any delay. And our order for the Fall of 2023 will be sent in December.
Seven other Ottawa Rotary clubs participate. They are Nepean-Kanata, Orleans, Ottawa, Ottawa Bytown, Ottawa South, Ottawa-Stittsville and South Nepean.
Rotary Clubs of Brockville, Kingston-Waterfront, Cornwall-Sunrise, Smiths Falls, Eganville, Arnprior, Napanee and Montreal-Lakeshore have participated in the District 7040 D4L literacy project over the past few years. Some remain on the project a couple withdrew.
And the project has expanded in Canada. Former West Ottawa Rotarian Susan Fisher introduced the project to District 7810 and 2 Rotary and 2 Rotaract clubs presented books to Sackville, NB and Fredericton North students. Great work Rotary Clubs of Sackville and Fredericton North!
At last count this project since inception has seen 6,165 hours volunteered by 2,359 volunteers. Total estimated cost is $58,546USD and $8,000USD in-kind by Bushtukah Inc. donated to our local communities in the form of Dictionary4Life. The data will be updated to reflect the past two years.
Our literacy project is normally augmented with the Ottawa Reads initiative wherein a team of volunteers read to students at Agincourt Road and Regina Street Public Schools. With Covid19 we are unable to do in-school visits.
And on our website is the Free Reading Program -- check it out in the right hand column of this website's home page.