J Dent Educ. 68(8): 880-900 2004
© 2004 American Dental Education Association
Applicants to U.S. Dental Schools: An Analysis of the 2002 Entering Class
Richard G. Weaver, D.D.S.;
Satyan Ramanna, M.S.;
N. Karl Haden, Ph.D.;
Richard W. Valachovic, D.M.D., M.P.H.
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Abstract
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In 2002, there were 7,537 applicants to all entering dental school classes in the United States. This represents a 1.7 percent increase over the number of applicants in 2001. Between the peak of applicants in 1997 (at 9,829) and 2001, the number declined 25.0 percent. (This is similar to the percent decline that occurred in medical school applicants since their peak in 1996, at 46,968.) Dental schools reported 4,372 first-time, first-year enrollees in 2002. This is an increase of 105 first-time, first-year enrollees over the number reported in 2001. With the 1.7 percent increase in applicants and the 2.5 percent increase in first-time, first-year enrollees over last year, 58 percent of the dental school applicants were enrolled in 2002. This is up very slightly from 57.6 percent in 2001. Since 1989 when dental school enrollment once again began to increase, the number of first-time, first-year enrollees has increased 17.7 percent. (Total first-year enrollment, which includes first-time enrollees and repeat students, has increased 11.8 percent since 1989.) The number of applicants per first-time, first-year position was 1.72 in 2002. It was 2.31 in 1997. (The most recent low was 1.34 in 1989.) The average GPA and DAT scores of first-time, first-year enrollees in 2002 were essentially unchanged from what they were in 2001. Women were 43.7 percent of the applicants and 42.7 percent of first-time, first-year enrollees in 2002, slight increases from what they were in 2001. Underrepresented minorities comprised 12.8 percent of the applicants and 11.4 percent of the first-time, first-year enrollees in 2002. These percentages are little changed from those reported in 2001.
The annual applicant analysis conducted by the American Dental Education Association (ADEA) provides a compilation of data on selected characteristics of the applicants to and first-time enrollees of entering dental school classes. In addition to the number of applicants and first-time enrollees, the report includes aggregate and individual school-based information about these groups’ gender, race/ethnicity, and geographic distribution by state, Canada, and other foreign countries. Other items reported in this analysis are the number of predental school years of college and average GPA and DAT scores of applicants and first-time enrollees, by school.
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Methodology
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Most of the information presented in this report is derived from the files of the application service administered by ADEA. This service, the Associated American Dental Schools Application Service (AADSAS), is a centralized service that processes applications to participating dental schools in a standard format. Fifty-one of the nation’s fifty-five dental schools that enrolled first-year students in 2002 participate in AADSAS.
To finalize the applicant and enrollment data of the participating schools, each AADSAS school updated its roster of applicants to its 2002 entering class. Each school added to its roster the name of students who had applied directly to the school, outside of the AADSAS process. The school also added for their direct applicants the same applicant information as that of the AADSAS applicants. Then each school indicated which applicants on the roster were offered enrollment and which were enrolled in the entering class. The four schools not participating in AADSAS provided a roster of their applicants and enrollees, which included the same information as that of AADSAS applicants. The rosters were submitted to ADEA for analysis.
The following terms are used throughout this report:
Applicant: An individual who applied to one or more U.S. dental schools.
AADSAS Applicant: An individual who applied to one or more U.S. dental schools through the ADEA application service and whose application was forwarded to the school(s) requested.
Direct Applicant: An individual who applied directly to one or more U.S. dental schools, not using the ADEA application service. (A direct applicant could have also applied to schools through the ADEA application service. The applicant database is scanned to clear it of duplicate applicants.) Application: A completed application received by a U.S. dental school. One applicant generates as many applications as the number of dental schools to which he or she applied.
Enrollee: An applicant who was matriculated at a U.S. dental school for the first time. Students repeating their first year of school were not counted.
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Findings
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Number of Dental School Applicants and First-Time Enrollees
The number of applicants to the year 2002 entering class of U.S. dental schools was 7,537 (see Table 1
and Figure 1). This number is the sum of AADSAS and direct applicants, "cleaned" of duplications. (Information for individuals who applied to dental schools through AADSAS and as direct applicants was combined so these individuals appear only once in the applicant database.) The number of applicants in 2002 was 1.7 percent more than the number of applicants in 2001, which was 7,412. This is the first increase in the number of applicants since 1997, when applicants peaked at 9,829. Between 1997 and 2001, the number of applicants declined24.6 percent. (This is most similar to the percent decline that occurred in medical school applicants since their peak of applicants in 1996, at 46,968.) The DAT count fell 40 percent between its peak of 11,093 in 1996 and low of 6,645 in 1999. Since then, the DAT count has risen 26 percent to stand at 8,389 in 2002. As the trend in the DAT count is a precursor of the applicant trend, as anticipated, the current decline in the number of dental school applicants began to reverse itself in 2002.
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Figure 1. U.S. dental schools applicant and enrollment trends, 1989–2002 Trends occurring in DAT counts, dental school applicants, and total first-year enrollments since 1989, the year from which the number of applicants and first-year enrollments began to increase, following their steady declines from the mid- and late 1970s
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The number of first-time enrollees that the dental schools reported in the 2002 entering class was 4,372. This is an increase of 105 enrollees, or 2.5 percent, over the number reported in 2001. (Seventy-six of the increase in the number of enrollees were from the opening of the University of Nevada School of Dentistry.) Since 1989 when dental school enrollment once again began to increase, the number of first-time, first-year enrollees has increased 17.7 percent. Total first-year enrollment, which includes first-time enrollees and repeat students, has increased 11.8 percent since 1989, from 3,979 to 4,448. The number of applicants per first-time, first-year position was 1.72 in 2002, with 58 percent of the applicants being enrolled. The ratio of applicants to first-time position in 1997, the most recent high in the number of dental school applicants, was 2.31, with 43.2 percent of the applicants being enrolled. The most recent low ratio was 1.34 in 1989, with 74.4 percent of the applicants enrolled.
Women comprised almost 44 percent of the 2002 dental school applicants (see Table 2). This percentage continues the slight increases in women applicants that have occurred since 1996, prior to which time women applicants had been fluctuating around 36 percent.
The percentage of women first-time enrollees was almost 43 percent in 2002, up slightly from 42 percent in 2001. This becomes the largest percentage and number of women enrolled in U.S. dental schools. The percent of women applicants enrolled in 2002 was 56.7; the percent of men applicants enrolled was 58.9. Schools continued to draw similar percentages of enrollees from each gender pool of applicants.
Applicant and Enrollee Composition by Race/Ethnicity
There was little overall change in the number and percent of applicants and first-time enrollees by race/ethnicity between 2001 and 2002. Table 3 presents this information for the entering class of 2002. Referring to Figures 2 and 3, the numbers displayed in a trend of applicants and first-time, first-year enrollment by race/ethnicity indicate a continuing decline in the number of Asian/Pacific Islanders, standing at about 20 percent of applicants and enrollees in 2002. (In 1997, Asian/Pacific Islanders comprised about 25 percent of the applicants and enrollees.) There was essentially no change in the number of Black/African American applicants (425) and enrollees (233) between 2001 and 2002. Hispanic/Latino applicants were up slightly, from 466 to 488; but their enrollment was down slightly, from 254 to 241. Native American/Alaska Native applicants and enrollees both increased: applicants from 38 to 49, enrollees from 19 to 25. Overall, underrepresented minorities accounted for about 11.4 percent of the first-time enrollees in 2002, up slightly from 10 percent in 1997.
There has been no increase in the size of the underrepresented minority applicant pool over the last five years, following a slow but sustained growth during the early to mid-1990s. And while the number of underrepresented minority enrollees has increased since 1998 and reached again a number similar to that of the early 1990s, the number of underrepresented minority enrollees was essentially flat between 2001 and 2002. To increase the number of underrepresented minority enrollees, it will be necessary to increase efforts to attract and recruit more underrepresented minorities into considering careers in dentistry.
Geographic Distribution of Applications and Enrollees
The average number of applications submitted by the year 2002 dental school applicants was 6.8, down from 7.2 in 2001 and 7.5 in 2000. (The recent high number of applications per applicant was 7.9 in 1997.) This produced a total of 51,442 dental school applications in 2002. Table 4 (pages 887–890) presents the number of applications received by each school (which for the school is their number of applicants) and the geographic distribution of their applications/applicants. The listed number of applications received by school is the total of each school’s AADSAS applications of record at ADEA plus any direct applicants reported by the school. The distribution is by state; other U.S. territories, trusts, and commonwealths; Canada; and foreign country other than Canada.
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Table 4. Number of applications received by each school and the geographic distribution of its applications/ applicants
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Table 5 (pages 891–894) presents each dental school’s reported number of first-time enrollees to its 2002 entering class and the geographic distribution of the school’s enrollees by state; other U.S. territories, trusts, and commonwealths; Canada; and foreign country other than Canada.
Reviewing Tables 4
and 5 together clearly illustrates from where the schools are receiving their applicants and the initial legal residence of their enrollees. Private dental schools tended to have larger numbers of applicants then public dental schools, with Tufts University and Boston University each having more than 2,000 applicants, followed by New York University (1,910) and Temple University (1,879). The University of the Pacific and Nova Southeastern University each had more than 1,700 applicants. Almost 4 percent of the applications were from residents of Canada, down from 5 percent in 2001. Two percent of the enrollees were residents of Canada, also down slightly, from 2.4 percent in 2001.
Total and In-State Applications and Enrollees by Dental School
Table 6 (page 895) presents each school’s number of in-state applicants and enrollees and the percentage of each school’s applicants and enrollees that are in-state. Table 6 provides a more aggregate display of from where schools are receiving their applicants (in-state/out of state) and the initial residence of their enrollees.
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Table 6. Each school’s number of in-state applicants and enrollees and the percentage of each school’s applicants and enrollees that are in-state
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Applicants and Enrollees by Region and State
Tables 4, 5, and 6 present information about the geographic distribution of the 51,442 applications to and 4,372 first-time enrollees in the individual dental schools. While each application is an applicant to a dental school, as previously mentioned, there were only 7,537 dental school applicants in 2002. Table 7 (page 896) presents the geographic distribution of the 7,537 applicants (at the time of application) by region; state; other U.S. territories, trusts, and commonwealths; Canada; and foreign country other than Canada.
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Table 7. Geographic distribution of applicants and enrollees (as determined by legal residence at the time of application)
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The largest number of applicants came from California (1,047), followed by Texas (513), New York (350), and Florida (346). There were 242 applicants from Canada and 198 from other foreign countries. Table 7 also presents the number of enrollees by these same categories, as well as the percent of applicants enrolled.
Applications and Enrollees by Gender and Race/Ethnicity by Dental School
Tables 2 and 3 present the percentage composition of all dental school applicants and enrollees by gender and race/ethnicity in aggregate. Tables 8 and 9 (pages 897 and 898) present each school’s composition of applications and enrollees by gender and race/ethnicity. In Table 8, the individual number of men and women enrolled at each school is shown as a percentage of the men and women applicants to each school. This affords comparison of percent enrollment from each gender pool of applicants. This table also shows the percentage of each school’s 2002 applicants and enrollees who were male and female.
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Table 9. Number of applicants and enrollees by race/ethnicity for each school (for whom such information was available)
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Table 9 presents numbers of applicants and enrollees by race/ethnicity (for whom such information was available) by school without percentages, since cell size for minority applicants and enrollees by school is small.
Applications and Enrollees by Predental Years of College and Major Areas of Study
The number of applications and enrollees by the year of college at the time of application, by dental school, is presented in Table 10 (page 899). Seventy-one percent of the applications were from individuals who reported they were in their senior year of college at the time of application. Likewise, 71 percent of the enrollees were individuals who had applied to dental school in their senior year of college. Slightly over 11 percent of the applications were from individuals who were in graduate school. Almost 11 percent of the enrollees had some level of graduate education.
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Table 10. Numbers, by dental school, of applicants and enrollees by the year of college at the time of application
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Over 9 percent of the applications came from individuals who indicated "Other" as their enrollment status at the time of application. This would include individuals pursuing college credits towards a degree on a more flexible time schedule than the traditional freshman to senior four-year program and were in a fifth or more year of college. Eight percent of the enrollees came from this group of applicants.
A little over 8 percent of the applications were from individuals with three or fewer years of college; likewise, a little over 10 percent of the first-time, first-year enrollees had three or fewer years of college. It would appear that about 10 percent of the successful enrollees with three or fewer years of college were individuals in specific predental/dental school track programs conducted by several dental schools. As in past years, about 90 percent or more of the applicants and enrollees have had four or more years of college.
The major area of study for dental school applicants and enrollees was biological science, 51.2 and 54.1 percent respectively (Table 11, page 886). Chemistry/physics was the major area of study for 14.1 percent of the applicants and 14.8 percent of the enrollees. Only 14.1 percent of the applicants and 12.9 percent of the enrollees indicated that predentistry (or other health profession) was their major area of study.
Of interest is the percent rate of enrollment by predental major. As mentioned previously in this report, 58 percent of the year 2002 dental school applicants were enrolled. While almost 82 percent of the first-year enrollees had majors in the biological/ chemical/physical sciences or predentistry/medicine, 18 percent of them had other than science majors, and their percent rates of enrollment were over 50 percent. Almost 54 percent of the applicants with engineering majors were enrolled. Over 54 percent of individuals with social science majors were enrolled, and almost 53 percent of the individuals with math/computer science majors were enrolled. Almost 57 percent of the business major applicants were enrolled. Individuals with majors in language, humanities, and fine arts also were enrolled at a rate of almost 57 percent, and education majors at a rate of almost 61 percent. It would appear that though the large majority of applicants and enrollees have their major in the biological/chemical/physical sciences or predentistry/medicine, as long as applicants meet the minimum required courses for admissions, equal consideration is given to all applicants, regardless of major.
Grade Point Averages and Dental Admission Test Scores
Table 12 (page 900) presents, by school, the average science and total grade point average (GPA) and Dental Admission Test (DAT) scores for their 2002 applicants and enrollees. Averages for all dental school applicants were: science GPA, 3.07; total GPA, 3.19; DAT Academic Average, 18.0; DAT Perceptual Ability, 17.7; and DAT Total Science, 17.8. These are all the same or slightly higher than they were in 2001 (Table 13).
The grade point averages and DAT scores for the year 2002 enrollees were also all the same or most similar to what they were in 2001. The averages and scores for the 2002 enrollees were: science GPA, 3.32; total GPA, 3.42; DAT Academic Average, 18.8; DAT Perceptual Ability, 18.1; and DAT Total Science, 18.5.
Age Distribution of Applicants and Enrollees
Table 14 presents the age distribution of applicants and enrollees. Almost 41 percent of the applicants and 46 percent of the enrollees were twenty-two or twenty-three years of age at the time of applying to dental school. These are most similar to the percentages reported in 2001. A little over 25 percent of the applicants and almost 25 percent of the enrollees were twenty-four or twenty-five years of age at the time of applying to dental school. These percentages are slightly more than those reported in 2001. All the percentages for the ages twenty-six through thirty, for both applicants and enrollees, are similar to those reported in 2001. Likewise, the applicant and enrollee percentages reported for twenty-one years of age are similar to those reported in 2001.
Overall, the age of the entering class of 2002 is little changed from that of the entering class of 2001.
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Footnotes
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Dr. Weaver is Associate Director, Center for Educational Policy and Research; Mr. Ramanna is Senior Analyst, Office of Information Technology; Dr. Haden is Associate Executive Director and Director, Center for Educational Policy and Research; and Dr. Valachovic is Executive Director—all at the American Dental Education Association. Direct correspondence to Dr. Richard Weaver, American Dental Education Association, 1625 Massachusetts Ave., NW, Suite 600, Washington, DC 20036; 202-667-9433 phone; 202-667-0642 fax; WeaverR{at}ADEA.org.
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Abstract
Methodology
