Virtual Dictionary Drive

Number of Dictionaries Funded So Far

Help us raise $2740 to buy 1000 college-level dictionaries! For the vast majority of people in prison with sub-standard reading skills, a dictionary is the key to understanding the books we send them. One prisoner wrote:

"I have only been reading now for about 21 months. I am 46 years old and when I get out of prison, my son will be 11 years old. And I would love to be able to read and write to my son. So please if you all could see to help me I will be able to help my son when I get home."

We are planning to buy the dictionaries at the wholesale cost of $2.74 which is over 40% off retail.

Donate 1 or donate 100. All help is greatly appreciated.

Quotes from prisoner essays:

• Why dictionaries are the most requested books. Because the level of education upon entry to prison is sub-standard by about 60 to 70 percent. I was a teacher’s assistant for sometime with a firsthand view of the education level. I can’t emphasize the importance of education enough it is the key. As long as prisoners are using dictionaries then its helping them to learn.
  
  Huntingdon, PA

• the majority of prison inmates have little or no education, and they are painfully aware of that fact when they sit down to fill out some kind of paperwork, read a book that is above their reading level, or simply write a letter home with all of the words being correctly spelled. I have had other inmates come to me with for assistance with all three of those tasks. Most of them dropped out of school at a young age and never learned or mastered the reading and verbal skills that I take for granted. Just last week I witnessed a man in his fifties that finally passed his GED test after multiple attempts. He was so ecstatic you would think he’d just made parole.
  
  Dictionaries help inmates with their spelling and in understanding a new or difficult word that they might encounter in their reading. I would say that dictionaries are probably the most important book that you provide to the majority of inmates. It helps increase their writing skills and word comprehension, and with that, they feel a little better about themselves.
  
  Huttonsvile, WV
    
• Why, you ask, are dictionairies the most requested items? It’s because almost 60% of the prison population in this country is either completely illiterate or functionally illiterate, and the average inmate’s vocabulary is horrendously infested with slang and ebonics. The majority of prisoners grew up in poverty, and studies that a poor child only hears on average 10 million words by the age of 3 while a rich kid will hear over 30 million words in that same time. Those dictionairies are as prize at the Bible, Koran, or Torah, and just as dog-eared. I know at least a dozen inmates who religiously memorize a page a day. Call it worshiping the word.
  
  Tamms, IL
    
  
• Dictionaries are extremely important. If you do not know the meaning of a word, you might miss the most important part of what you are reading.
  
  Tucson, AZ
    
• Dictionaries are necessary to enhance and assist one (in prison) to have an exact meaning of a word- as we/I have learned that in order to be able to express my most intimate thoughts, I need to know the English language through & through. Dictionaries makes that possible.
  
  Butner, NC