GTranslate
Over a six-year period from 2004 to 2010, the American Dental Education Association (ADEA) collaborated with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation (WKKF) on a series of Minority Dental Faculty Development (MDFD) activities. WKKF funded the MDFD program to identify better ways and best practices for recruiting and retaining underrepresented minority faculty members. The program was also intended to promote health systems change focused on primary care, prevention, and public health by building networks involving a variety of outreach programs. Of the six program objectives, mentoring was a major focus and is the topic of this report. This report consists of an overview of the ADEA/WKKF MDFD programs, objectives, and implementation; presentation of program results; discussion of mentoring approaches and the effects of mentoring; and commentary from representatives of participating schools about the mentoring aspects of the MDFD program.
Program Overview
ADEA/WKKF MDFD grants were awarded to ten U.S. dental schools and one advanced academic dental institution from 2004 to 2010. Six individual dental schools and one consortium of dental schools in New York state each received awards of $255,000. Those were the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Dentistry, Texas A&M University Baylor College of Dentistry, Howard University College of Dentistry, University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry, University of Michigan School of Dentistry, University of Oklahoma College of Dentistry, and the New York State Academic Dental Centers (NYSADC), which consisted of New York University College of Dentistry, Columbia University College of Dental Medicine, University at Buffalo School of Dental Medicine, Stony Brook University School of Dental Medicine, and the University of Rochester Medical Center. ADEA served as the central program office for selection, management, oversight, and reporting to WKKF. The ADEA/WKKF grants were used primarily to support direct educational costs of underrepresented minority (URM) and low-income dentists and students recruited to faculty positions that help promote health systems changes.
Grantee institutions were chosen for their distinctive capacities to implement the overall grant objectives and leverage resources that would support an infrastructure for sustainability of diversity-related outcomes and programs. Distinct features of the grantee models in the following states are being shared for their potential value to the leadership at non-grantee schools, new schools, and allied dental education programs:
Alabama and Illinois: These two models clearly articulated university-wide diversity mandates with resources allocated to diversity initiatives and accountability. These models demonstrate the potential and value of an academic climate for sustaining resources that affect both university-wide and external collaborations.
Oklahoma: This institution’s location and demographics provide a model for collaborative faculty development initiatives that can serve to enhance understanding of the many American Indian cultures that contribute to tribal and nontribal educational policies and resources.
Michigan: This institution has successfully defended legal challenges to its diversity policies and practices in fulfillment of the mandate “Excellence Through Diversity.” Michigan has the opportunity to contribute to framing rational discussion regarding the value of diversity to the quality of the educational experience through holistic admissions that benefit all.
Howard and Illinois: These two institutions were Pipeline, Profession, and Practice: Community-Based Dental Education Program and ADEA/WKKF Access to Dental Careers grantees. In addition to academic partnerships, they have developed strong community-based partnerships. These models serve as valuable resources for the development of social policy that links dental schools with access and community health.
Texas: This school conducts an Exploring Dental Academia course for dental students interested in academia and provides a model of STEM activities and information that nurtures interest in academia and guides decisions for career success.
NYSADC: This consortium model of the five academic dental institutions in New York served as a single grantee whose goal was to improve the oral health of all New York state residents through the enhancement of dental education, research, and clinical care. It functioned under shared leadership and common policies and procedures.
Following the MDFD pilot programs, ADEA/WKKF MDFD II and MDFD III (2012-15) were additions that focused on allied dental leadership, known as the Minority Dental Faculty Development Initiative (MDFDI). The additional institutions were the University of Detroit Mercy School of Dentistry, Georgia Regents University Dental Hygiene Program, and University of Minnesota School of Dentistry.
Grant Objectives and Implementation
ADEA/WKKF MDFD program objectives were academic partnerships for faculty development, academic-community partnerships, formal mentoring, community-based care, leveraging resources for diversity programs, and leadership and cultural competence training. Mentoring was one of the grant’s major objectives. The importance of effective mentoring to career development was highlighted in the report of the ADEA President’s Commission on Mentoring.1 This report challenged dental schools to raise awareness of the importance and value of mentoring as a means of supporting faculty development, recruitment, and retention.
Mentor and mentee surveys and institutional site visit reports documented the value of the mentor-mentee experience in the grantee schools.2–5 Data were collected using a wide variety of techniques to ensure richness, validity, and a satisfactory level of reliability. The data collection methods were as follows. First, site visit data included interviews, focus groups, and direct observation of program operations. Participating in the site visits were deans, program directors, other campus leaders, mentors, and mentees. Second was document review, in which a wide range of written documentation from the sites was collected and analyzed. These included policies and procedures, program descriptions, budgets, assessment/referral forms, curricula, and periodic reports. Third, Web-based surveys of leadership, mentors, and mentees were conducted.
Annual meetings were held among ADEA program staff, MDFD program directors, mentees, and the external evaluator. Meeting agendas focused on progress reports from each program, follow-up on mentee progress, and relevant issues facing each program. A logic model was used as a tool to assess program progress: implementation, input, output, and progress toward objectives.
The progress reports focused on mentee progress and mentor commentary. Qualitative assessments were obtained from mentors and fellows regarding their perceptions of value and satisfaction. Portfolios (narrative progress reports) were a useful tool for mentoring, career guidance, self-motivation, assessment, career tracking, and decision making. Peer-to-peer online mentoring was found to add value to the formal component of postdoctoral mentoring.
Results
Throughout the six years of the MDFD grant, fellows received not only financial support, but formal mentoring toward excellence in research, leadership, and educational foundations for teaching and learning. The schools placed particular importance on mentoring, which has been identified as an integral part of academic faculty recruitment and retention, particularly in medicine and dentistry.6,7
MDFD program fellows expressed the importance of their mentoring relationships and satisfaction with their mentors. For example, at a NYSADC symposium in 2008, one MDFD fellow quoted his mentor saying, “Your success is my success.” This fellow, with the guidance of his mentor, attended nine research and professional development conferences, identified short-term and long-term goals, and was awarded a K Award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for his research project.8 Indeed, the mentoring component of all seven MDFD awardees’ programs was found to be particularly effective. In a 2007 survey of MDFD program mentors and mentees, an overwhelming majority of responding mentees (91%) reported feeling that their MDFD mentors had made a difference in their lives in general.9 The majority (73%) also felt that their MDFD mentors made a difference in their career choices. Overall, the characteristics of effective mentoring relationships found in the MDFD survey aligned well with those in the report of the ADEA President’s Commission on Mentoring.1
Formal mentoring varied across the seven programs and often existed in tandem with or supplemental to the informal mentoring received from peers through social media. Formal mentoring required a written or verbal agreement between mentor and mentee describing the mentoring relationship and setting expectations. Mentees selected their mentors or participated in a group selection process. The formal mentoring process included academic policy review, assignment of mentors, development of goals and plan, mentor-mentee meetings and interaction, feedback from mentees, feedback from mentors, evaluation and changes, outcomes, and rewards. The process was linear and supported a concept of continuous quality improvement. It is important to note that, in mentoring, one size does not fit all. In all cases, an individualized, personalized effort assisted the fellows in setting goals, assessing progress, and defining successful achievement.
Discussion
Discussions regarding the relative effectiveness of formal structured mentoring programs and informal organically developed mentoring relationships took place among the grantee schools. Both methods have their merits and their drawbacks. Informal mentoring programs have been assumed to be better because of the natural chemistry that exists between mentor and mentee and forms the basis of their relationship. These more organic relationships are fairly rare, however, and often exclude underrepresented groups. Formal mentoring programs tend to be more structured and task-oriented. These assigned relationships sometimes lack an interpersonal dimension but provide equal access to mentoring relationships for all mentees. A third option that emerged in the discussions was the structured match. In this model, mentors and mentees completed detailed profiles (written narratives) of their personal and professional interests, areas of expertise, and demographics. Mentees then selected a mentor based on similar interests or backgrounds as described in the profile, thereby increasing the probability that the right chemistry would be developed.10,11 Mentees then also used their written portfolios as tools for both personal and professional development.
A key component of mentoring is professional development, a mentor characteristic identified as most important by the MDFD fellows.3,8,9 One element of professional development is attendance at professional, society, and research meetings and conferences. A dentist who gives lectures, seminars, or other presentations at school, local, state, or national dental societies is recognized positively in the community by fellow professionals and patients.6 For MDFD fellows in particular, professional conferences, such as the annual conferences of ADEA, the American Dental Association, the National Dental Association, the Hispanic Dental Association, and the Society of American Indian Dentists, were excellent opportunities to network with practitioners of their own races and ethnicities, as such networking possibilities may not exist at their parent institutions.
Other important components in mentoring included the value of collegial interaction of faculty mentors with fellows; variety in mentor program structure; the use and value of multiple mentors; and the importance of peer-to-peer mentoring among postdoctoral fellows. Indeed, postdoctoral mentoring at the MDFD schools improved the quality of D1-D4 student mentoring and elevated the level of satisfaction for both mentors and mentees.
Cascading Effect of Mentoring
Telephone interviews were conducted with individuals who received training with MDFD funding. Their profiles (personal stories) are oral testimonies that also document the cascading effect of the mentoring received in the mentees’ continued commitment to mentoring others through their humanistic approaches. The interviews showed that these former trainees are using mentoring skills they learned in order to identify, recruit, and mentor minority students at various levels of the academic pipeline. Many mentioned “giving back” to students some of the encouragement and guidance they had received. In spite of their busy schedules as teachers, researchers, and clinicians, they were serving as mentors, role models, volunteers, and examples of both personal and professional achievement.
ADEA/WKKF MDFD grant recipient profiles are updated through personal interviews and may be accessed online (adea.org/MDFD/Growing-Our-Own.aspx). The profiles document the long-term value of mentoring in professional development and the cascading effect of mentoring across distance, cultures, and generations.
Program Directors’ Comments
Many program directors who participated in the MDFD program submitted commentaries on their experiences. Their comments illustrate the wide range of experiences and benefits reported by the participants.
Dental College of Georgia at Augusta University, submitted by Ana Thompson, MHE
“What I experienced while preparing the proposal for the grant challenged me to face aspects of my career that I was not expecting. The valuable interaction I had with members of the ADEA and MDFD leadership were significantly constructive. This grant also increased my collaboration and interaction with dental faculty at the Dental College of Georgia. While working in the project, I interrelated with not only members of my institution when handling the grant documentation and budget, but also with members of the surrounding communities. I had numerous opportunities to network with teachers and school principals, school nurses and coordinators, and most importantly the children of those communities. Working in the MDFD project opened my eyes regarding the dental needs of minority children who live and go to school in the areas surrounding the university.
“Personally, my participation in this project opened many doors at the academic and administrative levels. The experience I obtained through several MDFD meetings and during the program also increased my opportunities for promotion from associate professor to professor and motivated me to seek other opportunities for advancement. Since August 2018, I have served as professor and chair of the Department of Undergraduate Health Professions. I lead seven allied health programs, including dental hygiene, in which there is a strong commitment for diversity and inclusion. In my new role, I strongly support faculty in their professional development and serve as mentor of junior faculty. As a minority, I strongly support the career advancement of other minority faculty and students. It makes me proud when I have the opportunity to mentor others and see their success. I am thankful for the blessings I received during my participation in the MDFD project.”
Howard University College of Dentistry, submitted by Donna Grant Mills, DDS, MEd, RDH
“The MDFD/MDFDI has had a tremendous impact on the professional growth and development of faculty at the Howard University College of Dentistry (HUCD). The program has provided a unique pathway for the expansion of existing community outreach activities and the implementation of projects designed to increase access to care in four major programmatic areas: school-based oral health initiatives, academic-community partnership-building, interprofessional education collaboration, and mentoring of junior faculty and students. Additionally, this phenomenal program has given me the opportunity to experience transformational mentorship while observing appreciable levels of academic career progress for junior faculty members at the HUCD.”
Texas A&M University College of Dentistry, submitted by Ernestine S. Lacy, DDS
“The MDFD program has been of tremendous value to Texas A&M College of Dentistry. It has allowed the college to target URM dental students with an interest in academia, offered mentoring and training to these students, helped defray the cost of dental school, and made becoming a dental school faculty member a reality. The students who participated in the program entered academia prepared for success. Many of these students are still on the faculty at various dental schools and are serving to diversify the schools’ faculty rosters.”
University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry, submitted by Darryl D. Pendleton, DMD
“The University of Illinois at Chicago College of Dentistry (UIC COD) MDFD program has been very successful in assisting the college in attracting and developing URM faculty, residents, and students. The success of the initial ADEA/WKKF MDFD grant has enabled the college to leverage additional state and college support for URM faculty development through the UIC COD Urban Health Program (UHP). Creating and implementing a plan for institutionalization of the UIC MDFD was a successful lesson learned.
“The UHP is a comprehensive pipeline program (K-12, undergraduate, and graduate and professional school) that recruits and supports students pursuing careers in the health professions including the allied health professions, dentistry, medicine, nursing, pharmacy, public health, and research. Due to the success of the MDFD program, the UHP comprehensive pipeline program now has a faculty development component.
“The goal of the UHP MDFD program is to increase and retain minority faculty through networking, mentoring, research opportunities, and skills-building with a long-term goal of directly improving oral health care at both the institutional and state levels. This is accomplished by developing faculty candidates from predoctoral and postdoctoral URM students enrolled in the COD and Chicago area training programs and by developing and retaining URM junior and adjunct faculty members at UIC COD and other universities.
“The essence of MDFD is not in the quantity of activities but in open dialogue—the acknowledgment of successes and failures that leads us in learning processes to continue to recruit, develop, and retain URM faculty. With the support of the initial grant and the success of our efforts, we have been able to secure institution funding via the UIC COD UHP to support our MDFD initiatives.”
University of Michigan School of Dentistry, submitted by Kenneth B. May, DDS, MS, Todd V. Ester, DDS, MA, and Marilyn W. Woolfolk, DDS, MPH (co-principal investigators)
“The University of Michigan School of Dentistry (U-M SOD) is successful in its mission of bringing MDFD and MDFDI candidates to the targeted outcomes of preparation to become dental educators and researchers through the efforts of the Gateway to Future Faculty Organization (GFFO). The MDFD-MDFDI program brought together U-M SOD’s minority affairs and diversity officers and leadership, resulting in a synergistic effect in the forming of a cohort of prospective participants. This sharing of resources developed into career and often lifelong relationships that benefit the MDFD participants, institutions, and the profession.
“To date, our program has a documented 32 colleagues with activities in education and research arenas as an interest or as part-time and full-time appointments. The 32 participants are infused throughout the disciplines: oral and maxillofacial surgery (four), pediatrics (seven), prosthodontics (one), periodontics (five), endodontics (one), public health (one), General Practice Residency (GPR; one), Advanced Education in General Dentistry (AEGD; one), community health clinics (seven), and private practice general dentistry (four). The program supported nine scholars, graduate residents, and junior faculty members from our pool of participants through leveraging funds from the grants and university support, which places a great emphasis on the importance of recruiting minority students, graduate students, and faculty employing the resource of loan forgiveness. Some items worthy of highlight that have contributed to our success are as follows:
Framing of proposals focused on leveraging dollars from U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) programs with our university recruitment resources (e.g., Provost’s Faculty Initiative Program, Strategies and Tactics for Recruiting to Improve Diversity and Excellence) as was done for Dr. Nejay Ananaba.
Promote networking opportunities for potential faculty members, as we provided for Dr. Bryan Williams and Dr. Duane Bennett.
The continuous promotion of dental education as a realistic possibility along with coaching and mentoring students and junior faculty in their career aspirations related to becoming faculty and advancing in the ranks, notably, Dr. Darnell Kaigler, Dr. Erin Ealba, Dr. Paul Lopez, Dr. Allen Robinson, Dr. Sam Malcheff, Dr. Evelyn-Lucas Perry, and others beyond the walls of U-M SOD.
The concept of critical mass is imperative. Through our MDFD program, we increased the number of URM students, faculty, and graduate students engaged in faculty development. This increase, we believe, had a significant impact on our dental school culture and climate.
Encourage students to pursue specialty and PhD training, for example, Dr. Erin Ealba, Dr. Allen Robinson, Dr. Duane Bennett II, Dr. Paul Lopez, Dr. Reynaldo Rivera, Dr. Tyra Jefferson, Dr. Fernando Urzua, Dr. Imani Lewis, Dr. Ebone Jordan-Ujari, Dr. Effie Richardson, Dr. Justin Echols, and others outside the walls of U-M SOD.
Encourage students and graduates to pursue opportunities in community clinics as we did with Dr. Rachel Torres-Hobbs, Dr. Natolya Thomas, Dr. Ogbonna Bowden, Dr. Ozzie Smith, Dr. Effie Richardson, Dr. Jessica Lee, and others.
Encourage students to further their education (in, for example, AEGD/GPR programs) as was done with Dr. Philippe Rouchon, Dr. April Patterson, and others.
The placement of our graduates in positions and programs highlights them as role models to impact the communities and educational centers in which they serve.
“A point of observation: one of our mentees in GFFO (a trail blazer of sorts) pursued an MPH program on her own without a formal mechanism for it to occur. While not a true pilot when she initiated her program, it did help U-M SOD in development of the new curriculum model that will accommodate students who want to get an MPH in the future. Now, U-M SOD has adopted a DDS curriculum model that includes a formal pathway for students who want to pursue the DDS and take a year(s) to complete a Master’s in Public Health, Master’s in Public Policy, Master’s in Business Administration, etc.”
University of Minnesota School of Dentistry, submitted by Karl Self, DDS, MBA
“Participation in the ADEA MDFD program has contributed to positive outcomes at the University of Minnesota School of Dentistry. Primarily, we developed a framework to broaden faculty development. Through the creation of a New Faculty Orientation and Professional Development program, we initially saw the benefits for the minority faculty members who piloted the program. This program was an essential element in enriching the performance of those individuals in the areas of teaching, research, and administration. The mentoring and leadership development not only enhanced participants’ commitment to an academic career; it has increased their effectiveness as role models for students, which may be instrumental in developing academic career aspirations in students from URM populations for years to come. Thus, the piloted program has been incorporated into the evolving schoolwide faculty development initiative that came out of the school’s most recent strategic planning process. Additionally, the ability to develop relationships with and learn from other institutions engaged in the MDFD and MDFDI program has strengthened my effectiveness as an advocate for issues of diversity and inclusion.”
Conclusion
The MDFD mentees received strong mentoring support, and many of them have accepted academic positions. Solid mentoring and institutional leadership committed to diversity have helped these mentees find pathways in which to work as academicians and practitioners that are both personally and professionally beneficial. The URM fellows are now engaged in community-based projects and activities that raise awareness of prevention in dental health, volunteerism, and in-kind care to children and seniors. All of the mentees have in some way participated in community-based practice and research in ways that have continued to strengthen their willingness to work toward eliminating oral health disparities and increasing access to both health care and careers.
Mentoring outcomes of the ADEA/WKKF MDFD program continue to be realized from lessons learned and support for diversity in the academic pipeline. Profiles of the grant recipients add to the evidence base for the need for sustainable mentoring programs that contribute to the value of diversity to educational quality and societal expectations. Sustained efforts are needed at both ADEA and individual academic institutions to support mentoring strategies at all levels of the academic pipeline.
Collectively, the MDFD institutions represent the variety of institutional profiles found in U.S. dental schools. Their distinct features contribute to long-term outcomes as envisioned in ADEA MDFD sustainability planning. The “Grow Your Own” philosophy for dental faculty recruitments and development is being supported in the institutional cultures and mentoring programs found in the grantee schools.
This article requires a subscription to view the full text. If you have a subscription you may use the login form below to view the article. Access to this article can also be purchased.
In this issue
GTranslate
Jump to section
Related Articles
Cited By...
- No citing articles found.