For Immediate Release: December 14, 2018
Contact: Angela Elles, angela@ginngroupconsulting.com

SMART™ Student Health Honors University of Alabama and Pickens County Primary Care With “Reaching, All, Transforming Lives” Awards at Annual D.C. Symposium and Congressional Briefing
SMART Model Architect Melanie Ginn Presented the Awards

Jami Leveen, Aramark; Dr. Karl Hamner, Univ. of Alabama; David Casey, CVS Heath; Dr. Julia Boothe, Pickens County Primary Care; Ernie DuPont, CVS Health, and Melanie Ginn, Ginn Group Collaborative, celebrate with the Alabama awardees

(Washington, D.C.) Two special Alabama leaders recently received the first “Reaching All, Transforming Lives” awards from SMART Model architect Melanie Ginn of Ginn Group Collaborative (GGC) and Ernie DuPont of CVS Health (CVSH), at the semi-formal reception and dinner following the 2018 Annual SMART Symposium, on December 4th in Washington, D.C. Recipients of the awards were Dr. Julia Boothe, Founder of Pickens County Primary Care, medical provider partner for SMART sites in rural Alabama; and Dr. Karl Hamner, Director of the Office of Evaluation of the University of Alabama College of Education. Two of their Chicago SMART counterparts were also

recognized: Gwenn Rausch, CEO Heartland Health Centers (HHC), medical provider partner for SMART sites in Chicago; and Javonte Barber, Utilization Manager at the Sullivan High School SMART Student Health and Wellness Center. Each honoree has played a unique leadership role in ensuring the success of SMART Student Health and Wellness Centers in their regions. For each of these leaders, “success” is, in part, defined by each of their significant efforts that resulted in positively impacting the trajectories of children’s lives. SMART stands for School Health Model for Academics Reaching ALL Transforming Lives.

“When Dr. Boothe made the commitment for her personal physicians’ practice, Pickens County Primary Care, to become the medical provider partner to bring SMART to Pickens County, commencing with the PK-12 Schools in Reform, Alabama, she literally enabled the opportunity to develop a successful, sustainable blueprint for not only her own Pickens County, but for all students living in rural counties across Alabama and the country. Julia has been a gracious, wise and extraordinarily strong partner that we are blessed to have in this journey,” exclaimed Ginn, President and CEO of GGC.

“Dr. Hamner was the first to reach out to me to ask me to come to Alabama and evaluate the feasibility of bringing SMART to rural Alabama counties, to support academic success of students who have such amazing potential, but who have such limited access to needed resources. Since that day, Karl has been a tireless champion of the model on behalf of his region’s students. His heart and passion for this work have had a lasting impact on GGC’s capacity to imbed the model and bring in needed funding from CVS Health and Aramark, as well as other key partners, like the University of Alabama, and Dean Hlebowitsh,” noted Ginn.

The “Reaching All, Transforming Lives” Award is in the shape of a blue crystal iceberg, which symbolizes SMART’s “Whole Child” approach to health care. SMART builds long-term relationships, through an Active Access approach, with the students and their families and school faculty and staff, to understand and address the often-unseen risks to their wellness that could lie beneath the surface, negatively impacting their academic and future success in life.

Dr. John Brandon of Pickens County was also given a special recognition at the gathering for his dedication and volunteer service in establishing SMART Clinics in Pickens County.

Jami Leveen, Aramark; Dr. Karl Hamner, Univ. of Alabama; David Casey, CVS Heath; Dr. Julia Boothe, Pickens County Primary Care; Ernie DuPont, CVS Health, and Melanie Ginn, Ginn Group Collaborative, celebrate with the Alabama awardees.

“I hope these beautiful awards will serve as a wonderful reminder to these individuals of their continued strength as leaders that recognized the possibilities, continue to help us challenge the status quo, and thus bring “Whole Child” care to so many more students whose lives have truly been transformed,” said Ginn.

The gathering was a celebratory dinner topping off the day-long SMART Symposium, a meeting of disciplinary leaders from the education, healthcare, and private sectors interacting in order to highlight the leadership and culture required to sustain this transformative solution that is delivering dramatic outcomes for entire school populations in both urban and rural flagship sites, from grades pre-kindergarten–12. The annual event was co-hosted by the Hispanic Heritage Foundation, SMART’s multi-cultural advisor, and GGC, and sponsored by CVSH and Aramark. In attendance were key members of CVSH’s Workforce Development, David Casey, Vice President, Workforce Strategies and Chief Diversity Officer and Ernie DuPont, Senior Director of Workforce Initiatives, as well as Jami Leveen, Director, Communications and Strategic Partnerships at Aramark. The following day, all the SMART Award Recipients and Alabama and Chicago’s SMART participants from the health and education sectors were welcomed at a Congressional Briefing at the Dirksen Senate Building, which included greetings from Senator Orrin Hatch’s (R-UT) office, a personal address praising their efforts by Congresswoman Terri Sewell (D-AL), and a white paper presentation on the leadership and culture that has created the success of the model, by Dr. Liza Cariaga-Lo of Brown University.

SMART is a school health solution dedicated to improving academic achievement in order to break the cycle of poverty, creating a new, antecedent component on the health care continuum. The award-winning public-private partnership that fuels the SMART Student Health and Wellness Model is revolutionizing health care in public schools. This best practice Model is being successfully operated in selected urban and rural regions, including Chicago and rural Alabama, with plans to expand to other cities over the next 5 years. The flagship clinic was funded by Legacy Sponsor, CVSH, whose support continues to this day, now joined by Aramark with a 5-year commitment to sustain and expand the Model.

SMART was developed in Chicago in 2013, and the flagship SMART Center at Sullivan High School has now entered its sixth year of operation. There, the Model has a tremendous track record of routinely consenting an average of 98% of the student population and providing care for 100% of those students, thus significantly increasing attendance by 3-4%, and improving the school’s academic metrics and rating, all at lower operational costs than traditional models. Active Care, a key component of the SMART Model, is deployed via Active Access, a dramatically changed capacity for impact, routinely reaching 95–98% of students, without increasing net costs. Sullivan Principal Chad Adams credits the SMART Model with influencing the culture of his school, “As I reflect on the turmoil I encountered while working to turn around a failing school, I now realize that having the SMART clinic was the primary differentiator for us in that process,” he says.

The SMART sites in Reform, AL have already experienced similar success, even in their first three months of operation.

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About Ginn Group Collaborative
Ginn Group Collaborative (GGC), led by President and CEO Melanie Ginn, is a nationally recognized design management firm with a proven track record in delivering exceptional outcomes and incisive analysis for clients. GGC brings objective and insightful perspective and expertise to review, research, develop, and deliver advanced business and legal analysis, strategies, and solutions. Learn more at ginngroupconsulting.com.