Eagles' Rodney McLeod Cuts Ribbon On First-Of-Its-Kind Health And Wellness Center At Olney Charter High School
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) -- Eagles safety Rodney McLeod has provided dental and health care for more than 3,000 students through his mobile Healthy Attitude campaign. On Monday, he welcomed the expansion of that program -- a state-of-the-art health and wellness center at Olney Charter School in Philadelphia.
McLeod cut the ribbon on the first-of-its-kind center Monday.
"This is the first health center that we've launched in the city of Philadelphia that's an integrated program with the health providers in the area," said Dr. Larry Caplin, CEO of the Student Health Impact Project.
The wellness center in Olney is an expansion of McLeod's mobile Healthy Attitude campaign. With the Eagles' help, RVs were transformed into dental and health clinics that traveled to schools in Philadelphia and New Jersey.
"For a lot of these kids in these underserved communities, they necessarily don't have the opportunity or they lack the health care, in general, so now we provide that for them," McLeod said.
"So we'll be involved in doing medical exams here, dental treatment here, vision, they'll get glasses from here, behavioral health evaluations," Caplin said.
The state-of-the-art center will be available at no cost to the more than 2,000 students who attend the high school. The community will also benefit from high-quality health care.
"This center will be providing services to our students during the day and then it will be open to the community at 4 o'clock, so it will be something that's not only available to the students that we serve but also to the community that we serve," Olney Charter High School principal James Thompson said.
"We treat them to make sure that their minds and their body is healthy. With that is a healthy attitude and it leads also to excelling in the classroom," McLeod said.
The work at the health and wellness center will be staffed by a nurse practitioner. The center will also offer training for students looking to get into the health care industry one day.
