MORGANTOWN — Several groups gathered at different sites around the Miss-Lou to make a difference Saturday.

That’s because Saturday was Make a Difference Day, an annual nationwide event with the purpose of having neighbors help neighbors to improve their lives in some way.

One of the groups participating in Make a Difference Day in the Miss-Lou was at Morgantown Elementary School, where volunteers — including Morgantown students — picked up trash, painted and pulled weeds.

“There is always a need,” said Sandra Washington, the Morgantown teacher who helped organize the event at the school. “I was like, ‘Why go out into the community when we can work here? We can make a difference in our own neighborhood.’”

School improvement will ultimately be the only way for county improvement, especially in the way of bringing in new industry or jobs, Washington said.

“When someone comes in looking to see about locating an industry, the schools are one of the things they look at,” she said. “They would pass by here and say, ‘Look at that gutter, it’s dirty.’

“They will say, ‘They don’t keep that school clean, I don’t want to send my children there.’”

Even though much of the trash around the campus was thrown from cars passing through the area, Washington said the school had another reason for bringing in students to help clean up.

“If they do it, they can see the change, and when they see someone throw some trash down, they’ll say, ‘Hey, don’t do that,’” she said.

When the work started in earnest, Morgantown student Hannah Jackson, 11, said she was up to the challenge.

“We decided to make a difference, and there is a lot of trash that needs to be picked up,” she said.

But that just served as an impetus for Jackson’s friend, LaDaria Johnson, 10, to pick up the trash.

“It’s going to be a better environment when we’re done,” she said.

Morgantown parent Sid Jackson said he was happy to help dress the school up.

“We know that good housekeeping is an integral part in making a difference with the students,” he said.

And that was enough of a reason for school nurse Katrina Maier to come out to the goings-on.

“I am going to do whatever they tell me needs to be done,” she said. “We’ll just stay and do our part.