Hello everyone, and thanks for joining us today. We're lucky to have the Dean of the University of Michigan School of Dentistry, Dr. Laurie McCauley joining us. So, Dr. McCauley, using the University of Michigan as an example, can you talk a little bit about the structure of a dental school? So, the University of Michigan is a dental school located in a public university. There are 66 dental schools in the United States, and at the University of Michigan, we have a dean, myself, who reports to the provost of the university. Many dental schools are similar in that reporting line. Some schools actually report through medical school dean or Vice President for Health Affairs. Then inside our school, we have five departments. Some dental schools have actually more departments, anywhere between three, and I think some schools I've seen up to 18 departments. Those would be much smaller departments that would be discipline-based. At University of Michigan, we have five departments: our Department of Biologic and Material Sciences, our Department of Cariology Restorative Sciences and Endodontics, our Department of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery, our Department of Orthodontics and Pediatric Dentistry, and the Department of Periodontics and Oral Medicine, which also houses dental hygiene. So, each of those departments have a department chair, and then most dental schools will also have associate and assistant deans that have various responsibilities that go school-wide. For instance, we have an assistant dean for student services, an associate dean for academic affairs, an associate dean for faculty affairs and institutional effectiveness, an associate dean for patient services, an associate dean for our community outreach or collaborative care and educational programs, and an associate dean for research. So, you see that similar pattern of deans, and those chairs and deans make up really the leadership of the school. So, can you tell me about the different degree granting programs at the School of Dentistry? So, our largest program is our dental program. We award a doctor of dental surgery. Some dental schools award a DMD degree. They're equivalent in the US. We also have a dental hygiene program. So, we offer a bachelor's degree. The dental hygiene program also has a degree completion program. So, dental hygienists who have obtained an associate degree can come back to get a bachelor's degree. We have that on-campus and an online program as well. We have master's programs in most of the dental specialties. We have a PhD program where dentist who are interested in further graduate training, most of them interested in academic careers or perhaps careers in industry, will obtain a PhD degree in oral health sciences. We also have an international trained dental program, where dentists who have trained at dental schools in other countries and want to obtain an ability to practice dentistry in the United States will come for our international trained dental program, and that program is about two and a third years, and in that program, the students matriculate in with our third and fourth year dental students and basically follow the same curriculum at that point. It's a real highlight because there is a large number of dentists trained in other countries, and in fact Dr. Nadia, I'm interested to hear your perspective because you trained in Australia. Tell me what your view of our international trained dental program and just in general your view of dentistry in the US versus Australia, for instance. What I really like about Michigan's international trained dentistry program is the two and one third years that you mentioned. A lot of schools have a program where students arrive and drop into the curriculum and then are immediately held accountable at the same level as domestic students, but University of Michigan has a long and rigorous orientation program which enables them to culturally and socially get used to the United States and academia in the United States. So, it's a very thoughtful program, and I think that it really does a great job of bringing the best out of these individuals who have a steep learning curve. They are not just learning dentistry in this country, but they're learning even about how social interaction is different, how cultures are different, and even how insurance is different, and in response to your question, that's the big difference I saw coming to this country is that the cost of care is about 15 to 20 percent more than in Australia. Of course, that's an estimation because there's exchange rates and cost of living to calculate all that. It is roughly 20 percent more. What this means is that insurance is a bigger deal in the United States. In Australia, insurance didn't really have a huge impact on my treatment plans, but here they can have a significant impact, and also in Australia, we had a broader safety net for people who couldn't afford insurance, and here perhaps we don't have quite as strong of a safety net, and so there's a lot of people who do not have access to dental services. So, we have to find innovative ways to come to their aid. So, what do you think is the best way for a dentist who's trained in another country to enter into the US into the dental profession? What are the things that they can do to prepare to either apply to an advanced program or just to experience and learn more about the profession? Good question, because I have observed highly competent candidates miss out on opportunities, because actually the reality is the International Dentist Program is more competitive than the domestic program in terms of number of applicants per seats. So, really good applicants miss out. So actually, we have a program through this University of Michigan School of Dentistry, which is to support applicants. It's to help them with their CV, help them with interview technique and various other skills, to help them get used to the emerging trends in the dental profession in the United States and just understanding the culture a little bit more to make them more competitive applicants when they put their application in for an ITDP program. How would they find out more information? There's a link through the Office of Continuing Education at the University of Michigan's website, and this program also has its own website which will be made available. Okay. So, Dean McCauley, when students graduate, what do they seem to value about their four-year training at the School of Dentistry? Well, interestingly you asked me that because in the winter and spring term, I go through a series of exit interviews with our graduating dental class. I ask them what they valued the most about their four years of education at the University of Michigan. The things that they tell me the most, the most frequent thing is they value their faculty. I can say that the faculty in the dental profession, and in particular at the University of Michigan, really care about their students' learning. The students will give me examples about how a faculty member would sit down with them, one-on-one with their patient, and really taught them and walk them through a procedure. So, they really get that feeling that their faculty care. The second thing, they value a personalized approach to their education. We have a program in the school that's called our Pathways Program, that allows our students to engage in something that they really value throughout their entire four-year curriculum. That could be that they're interested in a community program of global experience. It could be that they want to do research in a laboratory, but it's something that really defines their education, and they really value that. The third thing is they value early clinic experiences. At our school, our students right away their first term, they have their white coat ceremony, and they get a chance to get into the clinic very early on. Some other schools, it's much later in the curriculum. So, they really value that. Those are really the three things that they tell me that they really value on their four years of education. So, how important is the dental students exposure to research, and what role does this play in their career? Being in a research intensive university, the University of Michigan School of Dentistry is really fortunate to have a robust research program. Our students have the option to engage in that, again, in context of the Pathways Program that I mentioned to you, but some students do it even outside the regular curriculum. I think it's something that's really valuable especially when we're in a profession that's rapidly changing the technology. So, our students' ability to adapt to a changing landscape really demands that they have a foundation of critical thinking. I think one of the best ways to develop critical thinking skills is through engaging, totally immersing in a research project. So, our students may engage in projects that's laboratory-based, developmental biology. It could be early childhood caries. It could be an educational research project. They really can define that project and carry it out from start to finish. As a learned profession, we really have a responsibility to generate new knowledge. Again, our students are fortunate to be able to do that as part of their education. So, Dean McCauley, in your experience, what role does diversity play on the student experience? So, in the context of higher education and really in particular in dentistry, there's strong evidence that diversity enriches the learning experience. It's really valuable for individuals to be around people that are different than them, whether it is because they were raised differently or they have a different socioeconomic status, race. It really encourages their personal development and their development of critical thinking skills to see things from different perspectives. We value a diverse learning environment because we know our students will be treating patients throughout their career that may be from very different backgrounds. So, it gives them experience in being around people and engaging with people from different backgrounds, and it really strengthens communities. Communities could be anywhere from a global community to a very local community, a workplace community, the School of Dentistry community. For instance, we've had a really strong and robust committee in our school, our multicultural affairs committee that's been in existence for more than 20 years now, that really sets a tone for a collaborative and supportive community. So, I think the combination of those things really highlights the importance that diversity brings. Dean McCauley, how do you see the role of former students and alumni in the duty of educating the future dental professional? We are fortunate that we have more than 9,000 living alumni of the University of Michigan because we are a large school and we're very old school. We were founded 143 years ago. So, that's obviously many years of accumulating alumni. Our alumni are fabulous supporters of the school. They're role models for our students. They're mentors for our students. They're philanthropic. They volunteer. They're advocates. They really set the stage for what our students will see and experience in their professional careers. They have a strong engagement with the school, which is really uplifting for everybody in the community. An important question Dean McCauley, after graduation, what role do the students from the University of Michigan School of Dentistry take? So, it varies from year to year. But our class that graduated last year, about 49 percent of them went into private practice, 41 percent went on for advanced education. So, there could be two advanced general dentistry, could be two orthodontics program, endodontics program. Some of these programs have matched systems. But about 41 percent of them went on for additional education, and about 10 percent of last year's class went into some type of community or public health service. So, that could be that they went into the military, they went into a federal qualified health center to practice. That number 10 percent, last year, was a little bit lower than it's been. Typically, ranges at our school from between 15 to 20 percent, and reflects really the engagement that our students have in their communities. So, those numbers will fluctuate a little bit, but I think you can see the pattern. It's private practice, it's advanced education and public health type settings. Dean McCauley, any final remarks today? Sure. I would just like to summarize in general, dentistry is an amazing profession. When you look at factors that support career satisfaction, what you'll see people value is autonomy, complexity, and a link between effort and reward. It's no wonder that dentistry rank so highly when rating different careers because it's really a role model for all three of those. So, this MOOC is a wonderful way to explore dentistry as a profession. If you're a participant in this MOOC, you're in for a real treat. So, I will just finalize by saying what we say in the Ann Arbor, Go Blue. Dean Laurie, thank you very much for your time and thank you everyone for watching.
