Atmos, chamber of commerce distribute dictionaries to county third graders

Atmos Energy and the Henrietta and Clay County Chamber of Commerce partnered Tuesday in distributing a free dictionary to every third grader in the county. This is the second year for the energy provider and the chamber to join in the project.
Local involvement in the Dictionary Project, a national organization, began in June 2011 with a donation to the chamber of commerce of $500 from Atmos. With the funds, the chamber of commerce ordered 288 paperback student dictionaries, enough to carry the project through two years.
More than 140 dictionaries were handed out to students at Bellevue, Henrietta, Midway and Petrolia by representatives from Atmos and the chamber of commerce.
The Dictionary Project was created in 1995 as a way to provide dictionaries to students in three South Carolina counties. Since then, it has spread to every state in the nation. From June 2009 through June 2010, some 24 percent of third graders, or 83,172 students, in Texas received dictionaries through the project. In some states, such as Delaware, Montana, and Utah, the program has reached 100 percent.