MOULTRIE, Ga. — Statistics show students may not comprehend or retain complex text in a digital format as well as tangible, printed text. United Way of Colquitt County strives to continue building local children’s education through the Dictionary Project.

Each year, donors from the community help offset the costs of purchasing dictionaries for all third grade students in the school system, United Way Director Caroline Horne said. This year those donors included Colquitt Regional Medical Center’s Employee Fund, Moultrie Federated Guild, and Moultrie Junior Woman’s Club. Each of these donors covered up to 48% of the dictionary purchases with the remaining funds coming from the community through annual campaign efforts.

The Moultrie Federated Guild, Moultrie Junior Woman’s Club, and several hospital employees donated their time to present and teach each third grade classroom. Behind the scenes Southern Regional Technical College WIOA / GED students sorted, packed and labeled each dictionary with the graduating year, in hopes of inspiring excitement for completing all grade levels, Horne said.

These dictionaries contain all the elements of The Best Dictionary for Students; it also includes over 150 pages of supplemental information in the back. Key features include the Constitution of the United States; the Declaration of Independence, brief biographies of all of the U.S. presidents, world maps, and information about all 50 states, countries of the world and planets in our solar system, sign language, braille and the longest word in the English language.

For more information on volunteering, contact Horne at caroline@uwccga.org or (229) 985-2627.