Four dozen sixth- and seventh-graders from Memorial Middle School spent Friday at the Linn County Courthouse updating the landscaping with native plants and new rock paths.

The effort was part of the school’s partnership with the county.

“We’re gardening here at the Linn County Courthouse for a service learning project, so we can help our community out and make our community a much brighter and better place,” said Andy Khalaf, 13, a seventh-grader.

Service learning is an ongoing effort at Memorial, where students learn to brainstorm projects, look for partnerships, carry out tasks and reflect on what they learned and how it can benefit others.

This particular project involved students working in groups to design gardens and pathways, voting on the results, holding a bake sale and basketball “shootout” to raise money for tools and snacks for the work party, publicizing the event, and spending a day at the courthouse to do the work.

The county provided the plants, groundskeeper Michael Thompson said. They include bracken fern, sword fern, tall buttercup and Pacific bleeding hearts.

Because they will be planted under a redwood and a bigleaf oak tree on the northeast side of the courthourse, the plants needed to be relatively short and do well with a lot of shade, Thompson said. The idea is to increase the biodiversity of the property and bring in more native birds and insects.

Groundskeepers will maintain the plants, he said.

Khalaf said the project was not only fun but a good way to learn “life lessons.”

“Our community isn’t just, like, a given,” he said. “We’ve got to work to make it better. We’ve got to make it nicer.”