President Obama could make a good start toward fulfilling a campaign pledge to end childhood hunger by saving Philadelphia's successful school breakfast and lunch program.

Philadelphia is the only city in the country that has eliminated the bureaucratic red tape that gets in the way of providing breakfast and lunch daily to schoolchildren.

Known as the Universal Feeding Program, it works because students and their families are not required to fill out application forms to qualify for free and reduced-price meals.

At schools with high enrollments of low-income children, everyone gets a free meal - no questions asked. That removes the stigma that may keep students from taking advantage of the meal program.

The largely successful "pilot" project has been around for 17 years and feeds about 121,000 students in Philadelphia. Several cities want to adopt the model.

But the program has been on shaky ground since the Department of Agriculture under the Bush administration targeted it for elimination by 2010.

The USDA, which funds school meals, believes application forms are needed to better monitor the program. But the success of Philadelphia's program proves that's not true. The children who should get free meals are getting them.

If forms are required, many poor students and their parents won't fill out them out. Those students could miss out on their only guaranteed meal of the day. That doesn't have to happen.

Ending Philadelphia's feeding program would cost city schools $800,000 and have a devastating impact on the education and nutrition of thousands of children. Studies show students perform better academically when they eat breakfast and are less likely to skip school.

Anti-hunger activists are lobbying Mayor Nutter to help save the city's school lunch program. Nutter has said that ending the feeding program would be unwise.

The activists are also calling on the state government to expand food stamp eligibility and to pass a strong nutrition bill. An estimated 100,000 eligible Philadelphians aren't receiving food stamps.

The school feeding program offers one sensible, cost-effective solution to a growing problem in America during the current economic downturn - food insecurity, or hunger, especially among children.

Advocates should have an ally in Obama, who has said he wants to end childhood hunger by 2015.

The federal government should not only restore the pilot meal program in Philadelphia but expand it around the country. Schools can help take a bite out of hunger.