NATCHEZ &045;&045; Things were hopping Wednesday morning at Susie B. West Primary School &045;&045; and not just because it was the last day of school this week, with the children getting out for fall break.

Celebrating the anticipation of the 50th day of school this year and the 50th year of the &uot;Keep America Beautiful&uot; campaign, the students, faculty and staff celebrated with their own campaign to fight litter.

First-graders painted trash cans in their art class, splatter painting the black cans with bright colors of blue, yellow, green and red. Each of the school’s Partners in Education received a trash can to place at its business to remind them to &uot;Stash the Trash&uot; and keep America, Mississippi and Natchez beautiful.

&uot;We wanted to do a community project,&uot; West Principal Cindy Idom said.

Seeing many articles in the newspaper about cleaning up Natchez, &uot;We said, ‘we can do our part too,’&uot; Idom said.

A trash can will adorn the McDonald’s at Tracetown, one of the school’s partners.

Supervisor of the three McDonald’s restaurants in Natchez, Cel White, said he thought it was a neat idea. &uot;The Tracetown area gets a lot of West kids, so they’ll definitely recognize it,&uot; White said.

After the students learned about keeping the school, city and state litter free and making a pledge &uot;not to be a litterbug,&uot; the students’ shoes came off and it was time for fun.

The school celebrated the 50th year of the beautification campaign with a sock hop.

In some classes, the girls wore paper poodle skirts, with their pants and tennis shoes poking out from underneath the creative clothing their teachers made for the occasion.

And the students were not the only ones in the spirit, with teachers in poodle skirts and some in rolled-up jeans and tennis shoes like girls of the ’50s would wear.

Mary Fleming, preschool teacher for students with disabilities, came completely decked out in a button-down shirt with a poodle on it, rolled-up jeans, a scarf and sunglasses.

Not only did she get into the spirit through her clothes, but she cut a rug with the students, teaching them some dance moves to go with the ’50s-style music resonating through the cafeteria.

&uot;I did it for the kids,&uot; Fleming said.

After about 30 minutes of dancing &045;&045; swirling, twirling and jumping &045;&045; the students headed outside for a picnic lunch. Classes dotted the grounds, under trees and in the open sun in the cool noontime. Paper bags filled with ham-and-cheese sandwiches, chips, pickles, apples, milk and other goodies were grasped firmly in little hands as each class walked in straight lines out to its &uot;spot.&uot;

And when they finished their lunch, the classes practiced stashing their trash, keeping their school grounds beautiful.