Dictionary Project Director Speaks to Rotary Club of North Jackson

Mary French, Director of The Dictionary Project spoke to the Rotary Club of North Jackson at its March 3, 2015 meeting. Ms. French, from Charleston, SC, described how the project has been successful in improving the literacy of dictionary recipients.
She said that Rotary Clubs have distributed 11 million dictionaries in the United States and Canada and that 200,000 dictionaries have been distributed in Mississippi.She gave an example of how the literacy ranking of South Carolina has improved from 49th or 50th of the states to 42nd since the project was implemented there.
 
Ms. French was introduced by club Past President Don Roberts. She gave credit to Tom Johnson of the Rotary Club of Jackson  for getting the project started in Mississippi. Tom was at the meeting for her presentation.
The Dictionary project was started in 1992 when Annie Plummer, an illiterate, began distributing Dictionaries to third grade students near her home. Mary French became the Founding Director of The Dictionary Project in1995 when she reponded to a letter to the editor in her local newspaper. Since its founding, The Dictionary Project has distributed 24.5 million Dictionaries with nearly 10,000 organizations, including the Rotary Club of North Jackson, sponsoring their own projects. This school year, 2.2.million dictionaries have been distributed.
 
Ms. French is shown on the right during her presentation. We thank her for speaking to our club and for the work that she does with The Dictionary Project.