One local school hopes to help people scale back over the next 10 weeks.

Billingsley School will serve as a weigh-in station for the second annual Scale Back Alabama program, which began last week. The program was launched statewide with a press conference featuring “The Biggest Loser” contestant and former University of Alabama football player Roger Shultz.

Billingsley school nurse Wendy Glasscock said the school is serving as a weigh-in station because it is close to people in their community.

“The closest weigh-in sites are in Clanton or in Prattville for here. So, we just decided that it would be a good idea for our community to host a site to get involved with this program,” Glasscock said.

Another weigh-in site is at the Chilton County Health Department in Clanton.

Glasscock said about 40 people have signed up at Billingsley to participate in Scale Back Alabama, most of which are school employees. Several other community members are also participating.

Glasscock said this program isn’t just a weight-loss program or a special diet.

“It’s based a lot on ‘The Biggest Loser.’ It’s more about an entire lifestyle change than just losing weight,” Glasscock said. “It teaches you how to have a healthy lifestyle.”

The program begins this week, as the weigh-in stations will record beginning weights for each of the participants. Those beginning weights and final registrations will be completed by Jan. 26.

Glasscock said the Scale Back Alabama curriculum, which is free to all participants, features eight lessons. Some of those include setting goals, counting portion sizes, eating more fruits and vegetables, decreasing screen time, getting physical activity every day, drinking fewer sweetened beverages, using milk to lose weight and keeping off lost weight.

“The program shows us how to change our lifestyle to eat healthier foods and exercise more in our daily lives,” she said.

Those who are participating in the program also have the ability to compete against other teams in the state. Prizes will be given for those who lose the most weight in the state.

Glasscock said even teams on which each person lost just 10 pounds during the campaign would still be entered into a drawing statewide. Glasscock said she also plans to give the team members in Billingsley extra incentives and additional help to lose as much weight as possible.

“I plan to have special contests among our group to help us compete against each other to become as healthy as we can,” she said. “I also want to e-mail everyone in the group with additional tips and recipes that could help people lose even more weight.”

Shultz and the rest of the Scale Back Alabama task force hope as many as 40,000 Alabamians will participate, and they also want them to lose 500,000 pounds.

For more information about Scale Back Alabama, visit http://www.scalebackalabama.com or call Glasscock at Billingsley School at 755-1629 ext. 25008.