Rotary round-up
News of the Ashburnham/Westminster Rotary Club

On Dec. 21, 2006, Rotary Club President Dan Stango and member Michael Zapantis, the superintendent of schools, handed out dictionaries to all third graders in the Ashburnham and Westminster schools.

In the morning, the dictionaries were distributed at Briggs Elementary School with the assistance of the teachers and Principal Candace Wright. In the afternoon, at Westminster Elementary School, Stango and Zapantis were joined by Rotarians Laurie Benson and Joanie Anderson and assisted by Principal David Marble, Assistant Principal Patty Marquis, and the teachers.

A total of 220 dictionaries were distributed between the two schools. The club hopes to make the presentation of dictionaries to third graders an annual event.

At each school, Stango gave a short talk about Rotary. He explained the reason behind the gift of the dictionaries, described Rotary's role in the "Friday Night Lights" project - that organized the funding and installation of lights on the Oakmont football field - and mentioned some of Rotary's international projects - such as the effort to eliminate polio.

At the club's meeting on Jan. 10, past President Armin Steiner spoke about the work of the Rotary Foundation. This organization spends about $100 million a year on a wide variety of international projects including scholarships for high school and college students, group study exchanges, and a wide variety of humanitarian projects. One of the major efforts of Rotary members for the last 20 years has been "Polio Plus," the worldwide effort to eliminate polio from the world. Enormous progress has been made, but polio is still endemic in four countries so the effort continues. These projects are supported by the contributions of the over one million Rotarians around the world.

By vote of the membership, the time of the meeting of the Ashburnham/Westminster Rotary Club has been changed to 7:15 a.m. on Wednesday at the Wachusett Village Inn.

If you are interested in more information about Rotary, call Roland Morin at (978) 537-1010.