Four years ago, Roseanna Graham, then a student at the College of Dental Medicine, approached her mentors at the school with an unusual idea. She wanted to take her concentration in dental education – a strictly “in-house” track that offered students some background in course design and teaching assistant experience – a step further by obtaining an M.A. in education from Columbia University’s Teachers College.
      “It was a wonderful idea,” says Letty Moss-Salentijn, D.D.S., Ph.D., the Dr. Edwin S. Robinson Professor of Dentistry in Anatomy and Cell Biology and senior associate dean at CDM. “We have within the university this great college, Teachers College, that is a tremendous resource for any of the professional schools to train educators in their field.”
      So with her mentor, Marlene Klyvert, Ed.D., special research scientist and special lecturer, and support from Dr. Moss-Salentijn and Ira Lamster, D.D.S., dean of the College of Dental Medicine, Dr. Graham developed a hybrid M.A. program that combined content from Teachers College’s existing master of arts in science education with content from the dental school, as well as additional courses in instructional theory and practice, adult learning, and instructional design. In May 2005, Dr. Graham became the first student to receive both a D.D.S. and an M.A. in education from Columbia.
      She won’t be the last. A second student from the College of Dental Medicine received his dental degree with the class of 2007, and is now completing his coursework at Teachers College. A third student began her Teachers College classes over the summer. Dr. Graham’s pioneering idea has now become an informal program within the College of Dental Medicine, and efforts are under way to prepare a proposal to create a formal dual degree program, which may be a model for the medical school. If approved, Dr. Moss-Salentijn believes this would be the first such program in the nation.

Training Future Educators
“Without people going into dental education, there will be no one to educate the next generation,” says Dr. Graham, now on the faculty of the dental school and recently appointed the new course director of diagnosis and treatment planning. “Many dental professionals don’t have the opportunity to become exposed to any form of pedagogical education before joining the faculty at a dental school. I chose to do this program because I wanted to be the best educator I could possibly be.”
      And the program isn’t just for dental students; faculty member Laureen Zubiaurre, D.M.D., M.S., associate professor of clinical dentistry and director of the third-year predoctoral clinical program, completed her master’s in education through Teachers College in May. Both she and Dr. Graham are now pursuing doctorates at Teachers College.
      The program is rigorous. The students need to enroll full-time for two consecutive semesters at Teachers College – summer and the succeeding fall – which means sacrificing other summer plans for one summer. It is also a different kind of education than many students in the health professions are used to, Dr. Zubiaurre says. “There is a lot more group interaction and a lot more reading. It’s a great opportunity and definitely advantageous for anyone interested in dental education to do this, but you have to go in understanding that it’s not going to be easy.”
      With the nation’s 57 dental schools currently seeking to fill 275 vacant faculty positions, the program comes at an urgent time for the profession. “It’s very important that this program succeed,” Dr. Moss-Salentijn says. “It is very hard to find qualified dental educators, and it will get harder, as many of the current faculty are older. This program attempts to address the need to provide a cadre of new educators who can put together a course, develop objectives, write exams – all the things a good teacher needs to know.”



—Gina Shaw