LYNN — The Rotary Club of Lynn has distributed dictionaries to third graders since 2008. Wednesday will be the 16th straight year that the club participates in this project.
Former Lynn Rotarian Jim Harris first got the group involved in the project, according to Ray Bastarache, former president of the local organization. Bastarache and Jeff Barile took over as co-chairs when Harris chose to step away.
“What makes Lynn unique is we have 18 public elementary schools; most of the cities and towns in our district have maybe one or two elementary schools,” Bastarache said. “For Lynn to do this, it’s a mammoth project.”
The club chose also to reach out to the four private schools in Lynn with third-grade classrooms. Of the four schools, St. Mary’s and North Shore Christian School have joined the project, bringing the number of schools receiving dictionaries to 20.
“So that’s 1,276 dictionaries. 54 cases of them. It’s a huge project,” Bastarache said.
The project has two sponsors, Reading Cooperative Bank and McGrath Enterprises, and the club would not be able to do this project without them, according to Bastarache.
“What we do is we get the enrollment from the Lynn public schools. Now, I worked in the Lynn school department for 36 years, I know enrollment is like a moving target,” he said. “We get the numbers from October and again in November and those are the numbers that the school district submits to the Department of Education. From there we order the books,” he said.
One of the best parts of the project, according to Bastarache, is that each dictionary is for the child to keep.
“We attached labels to the inside covers of the books,” he said. “We emphasize to the students that this is their book to keep. In public schools many books are handed down every year. We want to impress upon the students as soon as we give them the books they should write their names in them,” he said.
Bastarache continued that they help kids sign their names and then do lessons with them to teach them how to properly use the dictionaries.
“It’s a great project and we really love doing it. The members really like it. A lot of our members work, but they take a few hours off on (Jan. 8) to report to the schools and get into the classroom. It’s part of our focus on literacy and education,” he said.
Bastarache has his own unique perspective for this project as he spent decades working in the Lynn school system.
“I’ve worked in classrooms for 42 years, both public and private. I was a principal and a teacher. I was a deputy superintendent. I went to St. Mary’s High School and was the first head of school there. Education is just part of my DNA,” Bastarache said. “I’ve lived in Lynn my whole life. The excitement on the kids faces when they get their own book is the best part.”
Bastarache continued to say that he’s seen how these kids treasure the dictionaries they’re given.
“I’m the chairman of the Rotary Scholarship Committee. I’ve had kids get scholarships and they tell me that they still have their dictionaries,” he said.
On Wednesday 38 Rotarians will be assigned one of the 20 schools in the city, and they’ll report to the principal’s office at 9 a.m. Members of the Lynn School Department, including Superintendent Dr. Evonne Alverez who will be at the Callahan Elementary School, will also join in handing out the dictionaries. Lynn Rotary President Jean-Marie Minton, Mayor Jared Nicholson, and possibly members of Lynn’s State House representatives will also join in on the project.
