Zonta awards

Two women whose work promotes the teaching of literacy and music were honored last week by the Zonta Club, an organization whose goal is to advance the status of women. Both women exemplify that goal.

The club gave its Women of Achievement Award to Jeanine Larson Dobbins and its Celebration Award to Judith Farris.

Dobbins directs the Missouri Statewide Early Literacy Intervention Program, which was designed to ensure that by the third grade all Missouri children will be able to read. She coordinated the recent opening of the university's Reading Recovery Training Center, which teaches teachers how to tutor first-graders having trouble with reading and writing.

Farris, a Cape Girardeau native whose career includes world-classopera and star-studded vocal coaching in New York City, recently returned home to teach vocal music at Southeast. Her teaching has had a positive impact on the already high quality of the university's musical productions.

Congratulations on well-deserved honors.