corrente

I was going to title this "Leave No Child's Behind Behind" but didn't want to give the impression I was making fun of fat kids when the intended target was fatHEADS, one in Washington in particular. To any fat kids reading this, I was once a fat kid too, but am no longer. I am now..old.

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) -- The state is eliminating a popular school program to teach healthy eating because changing policies have eliminated its federal funding, officials said.

The Nutrition Education Program, which served 600 schools statewide will be ended Sept. 30, said Evelyn Crayton of the Alabama Cooperative Extension Service, which manages the program.

Alabama's Nutritional Education Program has relied on funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food and Nutrition Service and matching money from local schools and governments. They supplied $6 million apiece.

Under the program, nutrition educators taught students the basics about healthy eating. Schools in all but one county chose to participate in the program, Crayton said. About 700,000 children were served by the program last year.

Federal officials now say the program must target food stamp recipients, and children don't apply for food stamps, state officials said.

A spokesman for the Department of Agriculture's regional office in Atlanta denied that the federal government directed the state to pull the program out of schools.

Crayton said the state doesn't have the money to replace the lost federal funding.

Miriam Gaines, director of nutrition and physical activity at the state Department of Public Health, said students will still learn some nutrition basics in health classes, but it won't be enough, given Alabama's problem with obesity. She said many schools have phased out home economics classes.