For city school kids, it’ll soon be reading, ’rithing and ’rithmetic.
The Department of Education is searching for dentists to set up clinics inside public schools — where even extractions would take place, The Post has learned.
The oral health-care clinics, debuting next year, will also offer cleaning and cavity-filling, and will dispense “information on tooth brushing, flossing, [cavity] prevention and management, nutrition, and refraining from the use of tobacco products,” according to DOE planning documents.
The agency said it worked with the city Health Department to hatch the initiative after recognizing “a lack of access to comprehensive oral-health care for students” at “historically underserved” schools, according to the recently released “request for proposals” document.
The clinics will be housed in rooms designated by the principal, and will be open at least one day a week during school hours. Parental consent would be required before a child opens up and says “ahh,” and Medicaid will foot the bill for each visit, according to the DOE, which will receive extended use permit fees from vendors for use of school space.
So far, the city has targeted eight schools in Brooklyn, including the Academy for Environmental Leadership; Academy of Urban Planning; Bushwick School for Social Justice, PS 269, IS 285, PS 256, PS 3 and PS 238; PS 40 and JHS 189 in Queens; the Urban Assembly Academy of Civic Engagement, Mott Hall Community School, Urban Institute of Mathematics, and PS 107 in The Bronx; and PS 21 in Staten Island.
The DOE cited federal data showing more than 51 million school hours are lost each year to dental-related illness in America.
And students living in poor neighborhoods are the most vulnerable.
“In general, these students are at a greater risk of poor oral health,” the document reads. “Tooth decay is one of the most common chronic childhood diseases — five times more common than asthma.”
If successful, the pilot program could spread faster than gingivitis.
“This program will serve as an initial study which will allow the DOE to evaluate best strategies for further expansion of dental services in the future,” reads the document.
The initiative is not the first time the city has injected its public-health vision on a captive audience, including making birth-control and morning-after pills available in school clinics; outlawing bake sales with homemade items that don’t list caloric content; and tracking students’ body mass index in an ongoing battle of the bulge.
Critics said the nanny state is gumming up the works.
“If we are going to decide that government and schools are responsible for everything a kid might need in their life, then we have fully replaced parenting,” said Bob Bowdon, executive director of Choice Media, an education-reform group.