Presenters tell committee school-based health centers, 'Semillas de Salud' and hub-and-spoke model expanded access and created training slots
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Summary
University, Department of Health and clinic representatives described a hub-and-spoke school-based health center model, local 'Semillas de Salud' pipeline activities and plans to match learners with clinical rotations and stipends to address workforce shortages.
Representatives from the University of New Mexico Office for Community Health, the New Mexico Department of Health School-Based Health Center Program, and Sunrise Clinics told the Legislative Health and Human Services Committee that school-based health centers, a hub-and-spoke model and a "Semillas de Salud" workforce pipeline have expanded access and clinical-rotation opportunities across northern New Mexico.
"Every student in Las Vegas, New Mexico has access to a health career club. Every student in San Miguel County has access to a school-based health center," said Matt Probst, director of rural engagement at the UNM Office for Community Health, describing the local pipeline and prevention-focused activities that feed clinical training opportunities.
Probst said those youth activities are intended to create a funnel of learners: health career clubs, health career classrooms and dual-enrollment Career and Technical Education (CTE) pathways that can produce graduates with entry-level credentials (EMT, phlebotomy, community-health worker certificates) and direct access to clinical rotations.
Kristen Oreskovich, clinical operations manager for the DOH School-Based Health Center Program, described workforce shortages that complicate expansion: she cited a Canal (Kresge) Foundation estimate (February 2023) that New Mexico was short roughly 800 primary-care providers, about 250 behavioral-health providers and over 1,000 nurses. Oreskovich said DOH will match learners (nursing, advanced-practice nursing, counseling, social work) to clinical rotations in school-based health centers and can provide small stipends to students in some placements.
Tim Dodge of Sunrise Clinics discussed community-school integration in Santa Rosa, where he said school-based services were used to identify needs and to place certified students into local hospitals and clinics for work. He described an example of a student who had left school and returned to earn a community-health-worker certification and later filled a local vacancy.
Matt Probst and Kristen Oreskovich said school-based health centers bill Medicaid and other payers to sustain services; Probst reported about 56,000 visits in the previous year for roughly 20,000 students through the school-based program and said the number of clinics in recent years expanded from a handful to dozens in the hub-and-spoke rollout. Presenters acknowledged federal and state funding uncertainty and encouraged local collaboration, preceptor incentives and partnerships to house more clinical rotations.
Legislators asked about telehealth, HIPAA/FERPA and summer service availability. Oreskovich and Probst said telehealth equipment is used to connect students and parents with remote clinicians and that some school-based health centers provide year-round services tied to community-school programs. Presenters also said they are coordinating with university partners (including Highlands and UNM) and with AHEC and Project ECHO to scale virtual learning and clinical-rotation capacity.
Presenters urged legislative support for preceptor incentives, sustained funding and cross-jurisdictional collaboration to keep rural clinics and training pathways open amid disaster impacts and federal funding threats.