JACKSON COUNTY, MI – Convenient access to health care has been a long-standing challenge for students and families in the Springport School District. Partnerships between school districts and clinic systems across the state could help turn things around.
Throughout 2023, Springport school administrators sought to survey the district and community members about the needs of local residents that were or were not being met. Superintendent Christy Robinson said a common thread in the responses was the difficulties and delays in accessing health care in Springport’s remote area.
“All of our teachers and administrators are very aware of how isolated we are where we are and how our families have access to all the resources available (elsewhere) in the county. “We’ve been talking for a while about how difficult it is,” Robinson said. “We knew that getting to the doctor was a huge challenge, and accessing therapy and counseling for children who desperately needed it was almost impossible for some families. I knew it was there.”
Springport is a small village located in the northwest corner of Springport Township, located in the northwest corner of Jackson County, but its residents often face challenges accessing medical care. Robinson said students who receive any type of general behavioral therapy referral often have to wait several months before they can make any connection with a health care provider.
The district applied for the grant through the Michigan Children and Youth Health Centers program in December 2022 and received the $300,000 grant the following March. After several months of searching for a partner provider, the district was able to contact the Regional Association of Healthy Schools (RAHS). The Michigan Department of Health Services has been considering expanding into more rural areas in recent years.
“We were excited when RAHS came along because we had almost given up,” Robinson said. “(RAHS) is looking for these types of grants. They want to make sure they go to areas like ours where we know kids aren’t getting that kind of care. I would like to do that.”
Since its founding in Ann Arbor more than 30 years ago, RAHS has gradually expanded the delivery of school-based health programs and clinical services aimed at improving the well-being of students and their families in Washtenaw, Genesee, and now Jackson County. It has expanded.
With the development of a temporary clinic at Springport High School (soon to be expanded), the RAHS program will have a total of 17 school-based locations within nine school districts in the southern Michigan region, according to Beata Mostafavi, Michigan Health Public Relations Manager. He said a health center had been opened. .
For healthier schools
The program that would become RAHS began in 1992 as part of a joint effort between Ann Arbor Public Schools and the Ann Arbor Youth Services Task Force to develop a school-based health center to better meet the needs of Ann Arbor students and their families. area.
According to the program’s official schedule, the University of Michigan and St. Joseph Mercy Health System teamed up to further expand the program in 1996, bringing in the Ypsilanti Community School District two years later.
The initiative was renamed Regional Alliance for Healthy Schools in 2000, officials said.
AAPS currently has three clinics within the district, with centers located at Scarlett Middle School, Pioneer High School, and the Pathways to Success Academic Campus.
“(RAHS) is one of the many great community partnerships we have,” said AAPS Communications Director Andrew Cluley. “We have families where transportation issues might be a little bit more difficult. Just having a clinic in a neighborhood school is a huge benefit for our family, and really for families across the region. .”
RAHS medical services are aimed at people under the age of 21, officials said. Officials said patients do not need to be enrolled students in partner school districts to receive services, and the clinic accepts both insured and uninsured patients, regardless of ability to pay.
Turquoise Neal, director of special projects for Ypsilanti Community Schools, said having clinics at Ypsilanti Community High School and Ypsilanti Community Middle School will provide area families with access to quality vision, dental, physical and mental health services. He said it has become much easier.
“It was really helpful in removing barriers to health care for students,” Neal said. “The staff (at RAHS) have become part of us and are an extension of the services we provide. They have been a great partner to our building.”
Neal said the clinics are set up like miniature doctor’s offices and are typically about the same size as a standard school office area.
“Students and parents can access (the clinic) without having to go through the front office,” Neal said. “Parents do not need to come to the front desk to check in; they can enter the clinic directly through the side entrance.”
“A place I’ve never been able to go before”
Mostafavi said the RAHS center provides many of the same medical services as primary care physicians in Michigan, including physical exams, immunizations and behavioral health counseling. The clinics in the Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti area served more than 1,600 students during the 2022-23 academic year, amounting to approximately 8,200 total visits.
Springport High School’s temporary clinic opened in mid-January and is staffed by behavioral therapists and medical assistants. Robinson said the therapist is actively seeing students and has increased his caseload by 16 to 20 clients over the past month.
The clinic currently provides only behavioral health services to the district’s 980 students, but administrators will soon use remaining grant funds to build a 900-square-foot addition that the center can house permanently. The plan is to construct a new building.
Bids were received in early February, and renovation and construction of the completed clinic is scheduled to begin in mid-March, Robinson said, with the district expecting to open the center by the beginning of the 2024-25 fall semester. He added that he plans to do so.
Robinson said the new space at Springport High School will include office space, two exam rooms and a dedicated behavioral therapist’s room.
“We’re pushing for a schedule for the renovations to be (completed) by June or July,” Robinson said. “We’ll be taking care of our children and ultimately our families and communities in places we haven’t been able to go before. The support our children will get from that. It’s great to see.”
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