In photo (L-R): Dr. Jose Aviles, Principal, Barringer High School; Dr. Mary Ellen Clyne, President and Chief Executive Officer, Clara Maass Medical Center and Dr. Roger Leon, Superintendent, Newark Public Schools touring the new ‘Blue Bear Laundry Room’ at Barringer High School in Newark.
Belleville, NJ – Students at Barringer High School in Newark will now have access to a free laundry facility, as a result of a collaborative effort from Clara Maass Medical Center.
A sign hangs above the entrance to a room called the “Blue Bear Laundry Room” which is now outfitted with two new, high quality commercial grade load washing machines and two gas dryers purchased from Paul’s Appliances, a small family-owned business that has been located in Newark since 1932.
As part of its strategy to prioritize the needs of its surrounding community through social impact and community investment initiatives, the Medical Center identified the laundry facility as a necessity at the local high school that would directly address the well-being of students – primarily those who are housing insecure and may not have access to a laundry facility either at home or elsewhere. By creating access to the laundry facility, students are able to wear clean clothes, thereby improving attendance, gaining confidence and ending bullying and ridicule.
The project was then quickly identified as an initiative that could benefit from social impact intervention by Sarah Bonilla, MPH, Director of the Center of Excellence for Latino Health at Clara Maass Medical Center, which earned the full support and endorsement of the Medical Center’s President and Chief Executive Officer, Mary Ellen Clyne, Ph.D.
“We really want the community to see us as a good neighbor, a friend, and as an anchor institution that benefits the community in various ways” said Dr. Clyne, who offered remarks during the Ribbon Cutting event.
The collaboration was formalized with a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the Medical Center, RWJBarnabas Health and Newark Public Schools.
“By partnering with the School to create the laundry facility, we are able to make an intentional, direct impact in the lives of our students, their families” said Sarah Bonilla, who also leads social impact and community investment and reinvestment initiatives for the Medical Center. “We even purchased the equipment from a local supplier to ensure that this this project makes a one-hundred percent investment in our community” Bonilla said.
To commemorate the opening of the ‘Blue Bear Laundry Room,’ a Grand Opening and Ribbon Cutting event was held on October 30th at Barringer High School which was attended by community leaders and dignitaries including Newark Municipal Councilman At-Large Luis A. Quintana; North Ward Councilman Anibal Ramos, Jr.; Superintendent of Newark Public Schools Dr. Roger Leon; Members of the Newark Public Schools Advisory Board Octavio ‘Tave’ Padilla and A’Dorian Murray-Thomas.
Also in attendance was Akbar Cook, Principal of West Side High School in Newark, who created a laundry facility at the high school to end bullying by creating a safe place for students to wash their clothes.
About Clara Maass Medical Center
Founded in 1869 as the Newark German Hospital, Clara Maass Medical Center, an RWJBarnabas Health facility, is celebrating 150 years of service to the community. Conveniently located in Belleville, NJ, Clara Maass Medical Center is a 472-bed hospital that offers a complete continuum of care to residents of northern New Jersey.
Clara Maass Medical Center has completed a state-of-the-art campus expansion of its Emergency Department, Operating Rooms and Post Anesthesia Care Unit with the addition of a four-story, 87,000 square foot medical office building that features a private Intensive Care Unit, main entrance and lobby, retail pharmacy and patient registration area. Designated by the New Jersey Department of Health as a Primary Stroke Center, the Medical Center has earned national recognition in patient safety and quality from Healthgrades and The Leapfrog Group.
The Medical Center leads the state in performing advanced treatment in ophthalmology, and has earned certifications in Disease-Specific Care from The Joint Commission in Acute Coronary Syndrome, Congestive Heart Failure, Hip and Knee Replacement, Cardiac Rehabilitation and Advanced Certification in Palliative Care, and has earned accreditation in Bariatric Surgery by the Aetna Institute of Quality program. In partnership with Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey – the state's only NCI-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center, Clara Maass Medical Center offers a world class team of researchers and specialists to fight most types of cancer, providing close-to-home access to the latest treatment and clinical trials. Committed to the health and wellness of its community, the Center of Excellence for Latino Health at Clara Maass Medical Center was established to address the social determinants of health within the local Hispanic community.
The first in the country to be named for a nurse, the hospitals’ namesake, Clara Louise Maass was posthumously inducted into the New Jersey Hall of Fame Class of 2017. For a physician referral or more information about Clara Maass Medical Center, call 1-888-724-7123 or visit www.rwjbh.org/claramaass.
Contact: Stacie J. Newton
Office: 973-450-2989
Mobile: 201-424-9678
E-mail: Stacie.Newton@rwjbh.org