Anchorage Daily News

The Anchorage School District for several years has dialed up its commitment to getting kids healthier. Eighteen months ago, it removed junk food from vending machines and changed cafeteria menus to make them more nutritious. Even parents wanting to bring in cupcakes to celebrate a child's birthday have been restricted.

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Now Superintendent Carol Comeau wants elementary school kids to get an extra half-hour a week of physical education.

The additional 30 minutes would be a 50 percent increase in the kids' current one hour of gym instruction a week.

The proposal presented in next year's public school budget accomplishes two things, Comeau said. It makes kids healthier in the face of a national obesity epidemic and it gives classroom teachers extra lesson-planning time, something agreed to in the current contract with the teachers' union.

According to a study by the School District, one in three of the city's public school students are overweight or at risk for becoming overweight.

"We have been working really hard to get more PE time. Really trying to look at the wellness issues and the whole health and fitness issue," Comeau said.

The $737 million budget proposed for public schools next year calls for 24 new physical education teachers in the 60 elementary schools. The gym teachers would divide their time among schools, said spokeswoman Michelle Egan.

The average teacher salary in Anchorage is $56,200, according to the district.

The superintendent's proposed budget still needs to be approved by the School Board and the city Assembly before it is implemented.

The district could have chosen an additional art or music class to provide regular classroom teachers with a break but it chose PE, said Patricia McRae, executive director of elementary education and a proponent of the idea. She agrees with the district's philosophy that educating kids on how to be healthy is a part of producing a well-rounded citizen.

Spokeswoman Egan said, "A large percentage of kids come to kindergarten already obese. ... So we know it's not the school that's causing it. But because they spend a lot of time with us, the more good modeling, the more the message from school is to make healthier choices, the better we are able to influence the decisions they make when they leave the schools."

This school year, elementary school kids are being taken out of their regular classrooms for an extra half hour of health instruction by 28 newly hired health teachers. Kids learn about nutrition, injury prevention and self-worth, among other subjects, McRae said.

In a typical day, children have about five-and-a-half hours of instructional time for all subjects. Their elementary classroom teachers, who teach nearly all of the areas of study, currently have three-and-a-half hours of planning built into their schedules a week. Many elementary teachers use time outside of what they are paid to plan ahead, teachers have said.

Physical education teacher Kim Rampmeyer at Ocean View Elementary supports the additional PE time. In the 22 years she's been teaching, she's seen a steady increase in waistlines. "It's gotten worse," she said.

Rampmeyer already teaches each of the school's 480 kids. Her only worry with the additional teacher would be finding the space for the teacher to work in -- logistically it is already tough scheduling the gym or multipurpose room because of their other uses.

Find Megan Holland online at adn.com/contact/mholland or call 257-4343.

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