LEWISTON, ME -- The Lewiston (ME) School Department was awarded a three-year grant worth $496,000 from a foundation headed by the grandson of L.L. Bean to teach students fitness skills and help them stay active for life, the Lewiston Sun Journal reports.

The JTG Foundation is a private foundation established by John Gorman Jr., a stockholder of L.L. Bean and the grandson of Leon Leonwood Bean. L.L. Bean is a Freeport, ME-based mail-order and retail company that specializes in clothing and outdoor recreation equipment.

Lewiston schools will increase physical opportunities, from dance to more active learning, the newspaper reports. Next year, Lewiston Middle School will get a new fitness center, and the year after, K-6 schools will get 10-station fitness centers, according to the newspaper.

“This is a dream come true,” Regis Beaulieu, the Lewiston School Department health coordinator, said at a committee meeting Monday night. “Children now who enter our school system are going to have unprecedented, collaborative, wellness education that will follow them throughout their grades.”

Individual student fitness assessments, or fitnessgrams, similar to those created by The Cooper Institute of Dallas and used in Texas schools, will be taken of every student in Maine and shared with their parents, the newspaper reports.

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