To clean up the town, and in preparation for Communities In Bloom (CIB), the City of Morden went to the city's schools asking if students wanted to be part of beautifying the city.

Last time Morden participated in CIB they received four out of five blooms. This year they plan to go for five, says Clare Agnew Director of Community Services, and in the process cleaning up the town and involving the community.

"There are six categories in CIB, and tidiness is one of them. Rather than us always just sending the staff out, we thought it be good if the students got involved, and see that we have to pick up garbage."

Three schools participated, Maple Leaf Elementary School, Ecole Morden Middle School and Morden Collegiate, and each was placed in different areas of the city to clean up.

Morden Police Service and Morden Fire Department watched the Highway 3 as high school students walked along the ditches picking up trash, EMMS cleaned up around the Access Event Centre, while Maple Leaf's grade threes took care of Morden Park.

EMMS teacher Mandi Zacharias says the city had approached their school to take part in CIB, with principal Mike Keith encouraging the grade three students to take part as it was a great opportunity.

The students were 100 percent eager says Zacharias and getting the kids involved connects them to their community.

"Any chance you can get students involved in helping out their own community it gives them a sense of connection to the community a sense of ownership. I've heard lots of kids saying this makes me mad no one is taking care of our park, we need to let people know we need to take care of the park."

Many students were proud to take part in the cleanup, excited to come back later in the summer to a clean park which they made possible.

Lincoln and Kiera were two students who wanted to share their thoughts on taking care of Morden.

"I don't like seeing a lot of garbage because it shows us how Morden Park gets treated," says Lincoln, Kiera agrees. " I think people in the community need to take care of our park more."

Both Lincoln and Kiera say they like to clean up garbage because it was due to their hard work that Morden Park is beautiful again.

The city of Morden is inviting all residents of the community to take a part in beautifying Morden, whether through landscaping, tidiness, or other ways residents can post their work on Facebook and Twitter with the hashtag #beautifymorden.