Southwest Community Development Corporation
Title: Southwest CDC Summer Camp Health Education Program
Student Interns:
Kaiya Tolat
University of Pennsylvania, School of Dental Medicine
Lydia Worssa
University of Pennsylvania, School of Nursing
Kass Zhang
University of Pennsylvania, Perelman School of Medicine
Academic Preceptor:
Hillary R. Bogner, MD, MSCE
University of Pennsylvania, Perelman School of Medicine
Donald L. Boyer, MD, MSEd
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia
Dalmacio Dennis Flores, PhD, ACRN, FAAN
University of Pennsylvania, School of Nursing
Abby Quinn Peterson, DMD, MPH
University of Pennsylvania, School of Dental Medicine
Elizabeth Powell, DDS, MPH
University of Pennsylvania, School of Dental Medicine
Community Preceptor:
Melvin Draughn
Administrative Assistant/Group Leader, Southwest CDC
Shaketia Sills
Program Director/Coordinator for After-School/Summer Camp, Southwest CDC
Jackie Simmons
Program Director, Southwest CDC
Shalese Reaves Thomas
Group Supervisor, Southwest CDC
Community Site:
Southwest Community Development Corporation is a community-based organization that runs a summer camp for students in kindergarten through fourth grade. The camp takes place at Patterson Elementary School and serves around 55 young scholars. Southwest CDC focuses on improving the local community through education and wellness initiatives. The summer camp provides kids with a safe, structured environment where they can learn, grow, and have fun while school is out.
Team’s Experience:
The Bridging the Gaps student interns created and delivered health-focused lessons and activities for each grade level. Each day, they worked with a different group — kindergarten through fourth grade — and adjusted their teaching to fit the educational level of each. Throughout the summer, the interns led lessons on exercise and stretching; nutrition and healthy eating habits; oral hygiene and dental care; first aid safety and handwashing; human body systems and organ function; smoking prevention and the impact of secondhand smoke and vaping; emotional regulation and conflict resolution; cardiovascular health and measuring pulse; and CPR and emergency preparedness, with support from Penn Medical Emergency Response Team (MERT). The interns created hands-on, interactive activities using materials like GloGerm lotion, sidewalk chalk, Play-Doh, egg cartons, and pipe cleaners. These items made learning more engaging and helped the children better understand concepts through doing, not just listening. Some highlights included designing paper plates filled with favorite healthy foods, building personal first aid kits, and placing organs into full body outlines they traced with chalk on the sidewalk.
Reflections
“This experience has meant a lot to us personally and professionally. It was incredibly rewarding to see the kids respond so positively to our presence and lessons. Their excitement, curiosity, and joy made every week worth it. We especially loved how much information they retained over time. Seeing them answer review questions correctly or tell us their new brushing techniques showed us that what we were teaching was sticking. Moments like kids running up to hug us or asking if we’d be coming back were small but powerful reminders that we were making a difference. It was interesting to see how many of the students had already heard about the heart or had been exposed to it in school. They were really excited to learn how to check their pulse and could clearly feel the difference between their resting and active heart rates. Teaching them that the heart is a muscle and needs to be exercised just like any other body part helped make the concept real for them. We also talked to them about cardiovascular disease, the risk factors, and the importance of staying healthy to prevent it from happening. BTG gave us a clearer sense of the kind of impact we want to have. We have always been interested in healthcare, but this program reminded us how important community-based education is. Working with kids in a public school setting helped us develop patience, creativity, and flexibility — all essential skills in any career that supports others. More than anything, it made us realize that meaningful change often starts on a small scale.”
Kaiya Tolat, Lydia Worssa, & Kass Zhang