ADG Sandi Hibbard-Ramsay attended the December 4th lunch meeting to offer congratulations on District 7070 being a recipient of a district grant for a project called A Ray of Hope, overall a $25,000 effort with ten other Rotary Clubs, spearheaded by Dr. Ruth Mathieson on behalf of the Rotary Club of Belleville. This new project is associated with the original Amarok Society that was established 27 years ago with Gem and Tanyss Munro, Christian missionaries who moved with their family into the slums of Bangladesh to teach 25 mothers how to read and write. This teaching was done for 2 hours a day from Monday to Friday for 5 years, the mothers having achieved fluency and literacy. Their job then was to go home and teach 5 children how to read and write. The result of this original project was that 90% of the children could go to secondary school in the area because of their accelerated learning. With this new district grant, a second Amarok school will be started in India and the grant monies will support that endeavour and also keep the current school in Bangladesh going. The mothers, with the education and learning acquired, were able to advocate for sewing machines and a bridge in their community to provide infrastructure for five outlets of fresh water. Many congratulations to the Rotary Club of Belleville, Dr. Ruth Mathieson and all involved.