Students attending the Jalen Rose Leadership Academy in Detroit will soon have a new academic home due to a significant donation from Henry Ford Health in the form of a former hospital.
In about two years’ time, Jalen Rose Leadership Academy (JRLA) students will move their studies approximately two miles down the road into the former Henry Ford Health Kingswood Hospital, which provided the Detroit area with comprehensive inpatient behavioral health care for decades.
The facility closed earlier this year when Henry Ford Health opened its new behavioral health hospital in West Bloomfield.
“We’ve long said that it was crucial to us to find a use for the former Kingswood Hospital that contributed to the betterment of our community, and we couldn’t have found a better partner to make those goals a reality than the Jalen Rose Leadership Academy,” says Bob Riney, president and CEO of Henry Ford Health.
“It’s a wonderful feeling knowing that generations of future leaders — even future Henry Ford Health nurses or physicians — will walk those halls. This partnership is a testament to our organization’s commitment to our community’s success and wellbeing.”
The open enrollment, tuition-free public charter high school is currently located near 8 Mile and Greenfield roads on Detroit’s west side. Once the former Kingswood building is retrofitted and renovated, students will move just into Royal Oak Township.
The existing JRLA space, which serves more than 400 ninth through 12th grade students, will eventually be converted into a middle school, allowing JRLA to serve students grades 6 through 8 for the first time.
“Since I founded the Jalen Rose Leadership Academy in 2011, my singular focus has been to prepare our community’s young people to become leaders in whatever their future holds,” says Jalen Rose, a Detroit native, academy founder, and a basketball legend — he was part of the Fab Five team at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, and played from 1994 to 2007 for various NBA teams.
“As our vision and goals expand, so too does the space we need. We are so very grateful to our friends at Henry Ford Health for giving us the perfect place to grow our family and impact. The sky’s the limit for our scholars, who will have the space to learn what they need in high school to succeed in college and careers.”
The former Kingswood Hospital spans more than 70,000 square feet over five levels. It was built in 1966, and became part of Henry Ford Health 20 years later.
Construction, including some demolition and retrofitting, is scheduled to begin later this year, with the goal of moving students in for the start of the 2027 school year. The existing location would then become home to its inaugural middle school classes at the same time.
JRLA will be launching a $20 million capital campaign to help fund the renovations. Details on the renovation will be shared at a later date.
“To us, this is so much more than the donation of a building, this is the start of a meaningful partnership,” Riney adds. “We are excited to look for additional ways we can work with Jalen Rose Leadership Academy, from mentorship programs to health care. We recognize a person’s wellbeing doesn’t just mean their health, and we aim to support JRLA students as holistically as possible.”
The future site of the school is located at 10300 W. Eight Mile Rd. in Royal Oak Township, and will serve students from around metro Detroit.
For more information, visit jrladetroit.com/.
