DETROIT – Detroit Public Schools Community District is launching 12 health hubs designed to address the behavioral, mental, and physical needs of students and their families over the next three to four years.
Chronic absenteeism is a problem many school districts across the country deal with, but it’s an issue that greatly impacts Detroit Public Schools.
Ahead of the start of the school year - the district is working on a new plan to double down on efforts to keep kids in school.
“If you think back in the 70s in DPS, there were forms of this happening with the idea of community schools,” said DPSCD Superintendent Dr. Nikolai Vitti. “And just over the years with emergency management, the disinvestment in public education, these kinds of things fell to the side.”
The neighborhood health hubs will be spread across the city to meet students and families nearby.
The high schools that will house the health hubs are Cody, Osborn, Mumford, Henry Ford, Western, Central, Denby, Pershing, East English Village at Finney, Southeastern, Northwestern, and Martin Luther King Jr.
Some of them will open this upcoming school year.
“We are going to have to take responsibility for awareness, marketing the opportunity, and continuing to break down just the distrust that can exist between our families and any kind of institution, especially when you are talking about medical services,” Vitti said.
Chronic absenteeism is a huge issue in the district.
Last school year, 68% of students were chronically absent. But that was down from 77% in the 2021- 2022 school year.
“I think one success comes from decreasing chronic absenteeism, improving daily attendance, which will then lead to improvement in student achievement,” Vitti said.
DPSCD received more than $4.5 million in grants to launch the health hubs. Some of the grants were given by the Ballmer Group, W.K. Kellogg Foundation, The Kresge Foundation, and The Children’s Foundation.
