After hearing several presentations and visiting site locations, the Board of Education unanimously approved a grant-funded school-based health clinic for Newtown Middle School.

The school-based clinic was first presented to the school board during its meeting on July 15, and at that session Superintendent of Schools Joseph V. Erardi, Jr, said when he first started in the district last school year the idea was already in the works.

School Based Health Centers of Danbury Director Melanie Bonjour, NMS Principal Thomas Einhorn, school district medical advisor Ana Paula Machado, Thomas Draper representing the Newtown Health District, and school district health coordinator Judy Blanchard all made the first presentation to the school board on the health clinic in July.

At that meeting the board learned the school-based health center would provide a licensed clinical social worker, medical care, mental health care, a medical/billing assistant, and an educational component, according to Ms Bonjour. The staff of the school-based health clinic would not replace existing staff, but would “extend the services of the department,” Ms Bonjour said in July.

On September 2, school board members again heard from a number of committee members that researched the creation of a school-based health clinic at NMS. The school board wanted to know how insurance coverage will work and how much it would cost the school district to implement the clinic. Dr Erardi explained only costs to the school district for having the school-based health clinic at NMS would be “soft costs,” covering the additional air-conditioning or electricity that would be needed for the space.

Dr Erardi, at this week’s Tuesday, September 16, meeting, thanked the school board members for their “due diligence” over the last weeks of looking into the clinic.

“Your passion behind this is very clear,” said board Vice Chair Laura Roche to the present committee members, “and we appreciate you sharing all the information for the questions that we had.”

Some school board members voiced measures they would like to see happen before the clinic is implemented. Member David Freedman said he wanted to make sure there was clear separation between the middle school’s nurse and with the health clinic staff, and member Michelle Ku said she would like information shared with the community about the clinic and how it will work.

Ms Ku said she was at first “a little bit skeptical” of the concept, but everyone involved answered all of her questions.

“I’m convinced this is a good thing for Newtown,” Ms Ku said, adding later, “but I also think it is important that many of the questions that we had somehow get communicated with the community, because I think that it is a process. We all had to go through it and somehow the community members have to also come to the same understanding.”

Mr Freedman also said that he was skeptical at the start, but now supports the implementation of the clinic.

“It really was due diligence and it was an extraordinary experience for me to go through the process,” said Mr Freedman. He noted he visited the middle school to see where the clinic would be placed. “You’ll see tonight that I will support it. And I’m happy to support it, because I think it is something that is important for us to have.”

While both board Secretary Kathy Hamilton and member Debbie Leidlein were not present for this week’s meeting, Chair Keith Alexander said both shared their support of the program with him before the meeting.

Mr Alexander said one of his favorite examples of how the clinic will be helpful is “a student who might have strep throat doesn’t have to leave school to find out, and may be able to just go back to class, a huge advantage that would have saved, probably, days worth of school for my students.”

After the school board unanimously voted for the clinic, Dr Erardi also thanked all of the committee members for, “their willingness to persevere over a long period of time in a very positive way for students.”