Students, families surrounding Pine Forest High are getting a much-needed health clinic

Escambia County Public Schools has taken first steps toward what administrators hope will be the transformation of Pine Forest High School into a Community Partnership School.

Community Partnership Schools take a holistic approach to addressing the needs of students and their families. They may include on-site resources such as clinics, food pantries, after-school programs and parent resource centers.

Last week, the Escambia Children’s Trust devoted $77,658 to the overall project, which includes the hiring of a Community Partnership School director and creating a pediatric health clinic on the Pine Forest campus.

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The medical clinic at Pine Forest will be modeled after the clinic at C.A. Weis Elementary School, which is already a Community Partnership School.

"This is exciting because of the window of opportunity it opens," said Superintendent Tim Smith of the forthcoming Pine Forest clinic.

Children's Home Society, Community Health Northwest Florida and the University of West Florida collaborate to provide services at C.A. Weis, and Smith added, he sees the organizations' partnership easily transferring and expanding to the Pine Forest campus.

"When you get these pieces coming into play — such as the community health medical clinic at Pine Forest — that's a strong statement of community support," Smith said of potentially seeking a Community Partnership School designation.

"It positions us for a good ask from Community Partnership Schools," he said.

Children's Home Society was a founding partner of the Community Partnership Schools model and is a core partner in 21 such schools across Florida, including Weis. The model calls for four or more core partners, usually a school district, a reputable nonprofit, a health care provider and a college or university. Each partner commits to the effort for at least 25 years.

Community Health Northwest Florida CEO Chandra Smiley echoed Smith's sentiments that local stakeholders coming together for the clinic is a good first step.

"It starts to position us to get all of those things in place so that we can go for a community school grant that will help them really get it and make it an accredited community school," Smiley said.

What will the Pine Forest clinic offer?

The new Pine Forest clinic will be setup in a mobile classroom where Community Health Northwest Florida will station a pediatrician and accompanying support and registration staff.

The plan is for clinic staff to have regular interactions with not only Pine Forest students but also students at the schools that surround it — Longleaf Elementary School, Bellview Middle School and Bellview High School.

However, its services will also be open to anyone in Escambia County.

Students will be able to receive annual checkups at the clinic, receive vaccines and have vaccinations updated.

Smiley said having that immediate access in invaluable.

"If you have a child, let's say that is sick, then we could get some treatment started pretty quickly so that we can reduce the number of days that they would be out of school," Smiley said.

Just like the clinic at C.A. Weis, the clinic at Pine Forest will be family oriented.

"The clinic at Weis serves the students and serves the community, and it's serving a lot of families," Smiley said. "You may have one student at Weis, but we're also taking care of all of the siblings, which may be younger. It's a way to help take care of an entire family unit."

Emily King, an assistant principal at Pine Forest, said "anything for us to build our relationship with our community" would be a positive.

"We are a school that has a lot of needs and has a lot of students who have needs — with our being so big, and we're growing every year," King said.

The student body at Pine Forest numbers just over 1,900.

"If you're sitting here thinking about what would be the closest medical facility, most of them that you're thinking about are minute clinics at the CVS or Walgreens," King said. "So to have something that is available to our community and our students that is close to their homes — because transportation is an issue for so many of them — it's just going to be fantastic."

Colin Warren-Hicks can be reached at colinwarrenhicks@pnj.com or 850-435-8680.

This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Pine Forest clinic a first step toward a Community Partnership School