A handful of Greeks cleaned up the lagoon by Stevenson Towers North Friday as part of community service.

Sigma Lambda Gamma sorority moved along the landscape near the lagoon with trash bags and gloved hands, collecting litter.

Gamma member and junior nursing major Natalie Fret helped to organize the event.

“I live [in Stevenson], and every time I look out the window I see it’s trashed,” Fret said. “These are pretty areas of the campus, and we want to make them look better.”

Gamma member and freshman accounting major Jennifer Mejia said the cleanup was a good form of community service because many people don’t consider the campus landscape.

“I think by cleaning it we’re saying, ‘this is our campus, we pay student fees, we’ve got to keep it clean,'” Mejia said.

Sigma Lambda Beta fraternity member and senior sociology major Salvador Martinez, Jr. joined the group as it collected discarded Styrofoam cups, empty bags of potato chips and other bits of litter.

“If no one ever [cleans up the trash], it will begin piling up to the point where it becomes a problem,” Martinez said.

Fret said another part of cleaning the lagoon was a sense of pride, and that accumulating trash takes something away from otherwise pretty areas of campus.

A dirty campus is not how they want NIU represented, Fret said.