Waipahu High School inaugurated its Academic Health Center — a first-of-its-kind school-based health clinic in the nation — on Wednesday. The Academic Health Center represents a partnership between the state Department of Education and Hawaii Pacific Health, which will provide health care services to the community while offering high school students hands-on training from medical professionals.

Waipahu High offers its 1,870-square-foot center as the facility, which features four exam rooms and one treatment room, and Hawaii Pacific Health offers its services of one nurse practitioner, two primary care physicians and two obstetrics and gynecology doctors.

The clinic will be open from noon to 4 p.m. Monday to Friday over the next few months until the clinic becomes fully operational around summer, and will open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on weekdays and 8 a.m. to noon on Saturday. Services will be offered to the community on an appointment-­only basis.

“Community members can sign up to have Waipahu High as their clinic and students from our high school can learn health care through shadowing the doctors,” Waipahu High Principal Zachary Sheets said.

Among the 2,500 students attending Waipahu High, Sheets said 500 of them are on the Health and Sciences pathway, which encompasses nursing services, diagnostic services and medical biotechnology, and human performance and kinesiology.

Sheets said students will go through Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act training — to protect patient confidentiality — among other training with HPH.

“When you look at this clinic, it’s about ensuring that we have a workforce-ready population, especially in the health care industry which is in need,” Sheets said during his speech. “We are benefiting our students, the state of Hawaii and our community of Waipahu. That is what education is about.”

Carl Hinson, HPH human resources director, said students also will have the opportunities to act as medical assistants or patient service representatives — a clinic receptionist job.

The physicians and staff on-site, Hinson said, dedicate 30% of their time to assist teachers in creating an authentic curriculum for students. They also will participate in teaching students in classroom settings.

“This program stemmed from a mutual vision (with HPH) to keep our students in Hawaii and ensure that our industries in need have employees of the future,” Sheets said.

Sheets said that this program has been four years in the making, between Waipahu High, the DOE and HPH.

As the clinic opens, Sheets hopes to promote health care within public education so that the state can help get local students into the health care industry because there is a need in that field.

DOE Superintendent Keith Hayashi, a former Waipahu High principal, aims to reduce the state’s “brain drain” through the program.

“We have so much talent here in Hawaii and we want our best and brightest to stay home,” Hayashi said. “For us to engage in these kinds of efforts, whether it be health care or IT, we will be able to better ensure that our students graduate, pursue whatever they want to pursue and stay home on living-wage jobs.”

Hayashi said he’s looking forward to working on more projects parallel to the Academic Health Center within the K-12 system to increase opportunities for students and create pathways for better education and workforce development.

“This being the first in the country is important because it shows that it can be done, we can work together and provide students with exceptional opportunities for workforce development,” Hayashi said.

Carlo Golez, a junior at Waipahu High, emphasized the significance of the clinic’s opening for students like him on the Health and Sciences pathway, as it offers additional perspectives for learning.

“In the near future, you might see 14- and 15-year-olds working alongside nurses, dentists, therapists, radiologists and more, dedicated to providing health in the community they grew up in,” Golez said in his speech.