District’s Third-Graders Gifted Dictionaries Thanks to Washington Township Rotary Donation

For Immediate Release
December 16, 2024

Superintendent of Schools Dr. Eric Hibbs chats with Wedgwood third-grader Myla Danso about the new dictionaries all third-graders were given on Monday.

WASHINGTON TOWNSHIP – Third-grade students at Wedgwood Elementary School had a special visitor on Monday, December 16th, as Superintendent of Schools Dr. Eric Hibbs, alongside representatives from Washington Township Rotary, entered their classrooms with some pre-holidays gifts.

 
The Wedgwood students – as well as every third-grade student enrolled in Washington Township’s six elementary schools – are recipients of brand-new dictionaries, as provided thanks to the generosity of WT Rotary. The organization’s efforts have been funding dictionary donations in the schools for the past 19 years.

 
The Rotary Club of Washington Township is an organization of business and professional persons, like Rotary International, who provide humanitarian service, encourage high ethical standards in all vocations and help build goodwill and peace in the world. Washington Township Rotary purchases the dictionaries from the non-profit group, The Dictionary Project (www.dictionaryproject.org). The goal of the program is to assist all students to become good writers, active readers and creative thinkers by providing students a gift of their own personal dictionary.

 
Dr. Hibbs helped make the presentations at Wedgwood, stressing the things the students can learn with the use of the dictionary that go beyond even the definition and spelling of words. The dictionary includes historical information, multiplication tables, a list of presidents with biographical information, and much more.

 
“Keep this somewhere so you can use it when you’re doing work at home or at school,” Dr. Hibbs said. “I still have my childhood dictionary sitting on my desk. This is something you can use for the rest of your life.”

Third-grader Brooke Chaloult reacts to the longest word in the English language, which has its own page in the dictionary.

Third-graders Dash Sullivan (left) and KJ Evans check out their new dictionaries.

Rotarian Bob Timmons hands out dictionaries to students in Mrs. Morgan Lamanna’s class.

Dr. Hibbs checks out a dictionary with third-grader Evan Tatarowicz.

- WTPS -