By By BEN RAYMOND LODE / Niles Daily Star
NILES -- Taylor Farmer, a fourth grade Student Council officer at Eastside School, made a positive impact on his community on Thursday afternoon.
Together with 30 Eastside School Student Council members, Farmer spent one hour cleaning up around the school before heading up to Eastside Park, where the students picked up trash at the playground and from the grass.
Eastside Schools Student Council is made up of 3, 4, 5 and 6 graders.
The clean-up ties in with Southwest Michigan's Days of Caring Make a Difference," which began Thursday, Oct 9, and ends today.
In addition to picking up trash at the school and at the park, the students also picked up trash found along the way from the school to the park.
Taylor, like the other students, wore at least one plastic glove while picking trash.
He said within half-an-hour, he picked up beer bottles, cans, cigarette butts, and, perhaps not surprisingly, a Dairy Queen bag at the park.
The picked up trash was put into black garbage bags the students carried with them.
Alexandrea Banks, also a student council officer, enjoyed taking part in the clean-up effort.
Although all of the students who participated in the clean-up may not be frequent users of Eastside Park, many of them are.
Eastside School teachers, Pat Roggen and Lynne Job, sponsored the clean up.
Roggen said the major focus of the student council is service activities.
The trash was taken back to the school and dumped in the school's own dumpsters.
Having in previous years organized an event each, the two organizations decided to combine their effort this year to create more of an impact in the community and allow for more participation from a diverse group of volunteers.
The two organizations anticipate that through the event, volunteers will donate more than 15,500 hours of service and create more than $250,000 in community impact.
For more information on how to join a team or take part in a project, call 269-925-7772 or visit www.uwsm.org.