MAKING A DIFFERENCE: PLENTY OF INTEREST

From time to time, USA Weekend lets us know how readers of the Southeast Missourian are responding to the many polls and other reader-participation opportunities featured in the Sunday magazine supplement. USA Weekend is a part of dozens of newspapers around the country.

Just recently, we learned that organizations, clubs, schools, churches and other groups involving more than 25,000 participants in the Southeast Missourian's readership area were planning to take part in this year's Make a Difference Day.

That's an impressive number but not a surprising one. Another indicator of community caring and involvement is this newspaper's annual Random Acts of Kindness Week during which some 20,000 individuals get involved in doing something good for someone else.

It was heartening to see all the groups involved in last weekend's Make a Difference Day activities, many of which involved students:

-- Foreign language club students at Central High School raised funds for an Indian village in Guatemala.

-- Charleston High School students ran errands for the elderly.

-- Men of Action, a mentoring organization, sponsored a college fair in Charleston.

-- Clippard Elementary School volunteers spruced up the school grounds.

One activity involved Central High School students who picked up litter in the neighborhood around the school. This is the same neighborhood where residents have complained recently about illegal parking, litter and noise resulting from the large number of high school students who park there during the day.

Such an activity might not end the problem residents around the high school are experiencing, but it's a first step in making a difference. Many students -- including many who drive cars to school and park on nearby streets -- recognize there is a problem and are indicating their concern by picking up some of the trash.

Although Make a Difference Day is officially observed only one day a week, there is no limit on the number of days that can be devoted to activities that genuinely make a difference.

Let's hope the students at Central High School, their teachers, their principals and their parents, along with the neighborhood residents, will see last weekend's effort as the beginning of a better relationship.

Can one person really make a difference? Yes. And a group of people can make an even bigger difference. And if all the people involved in a particular need -- neighborhood relations, needy Guatemalans, helping the elderly or mentoring young men -- work for the same positive outcome, they will make a difference.