FACULTY DEVELOPMENT DAY

was viewing oral health disparities through a rural lens.

“To me, it was completing a picture,” she said.

While in Iowa, she realized that solving the issues she was experiencing getting patients the care they needed and wanted required changes to policy at the state and federal level –and not just health care policy.

“Policy is important, but what you learn is that economic policy is important, housing policy is important, transportation policy is important,” Williams said. “All of that impacts my ability to do a filling on a patient, or to hopefully have a child come in for an exam.”

Williams discovered GSDM through the recommendation of Dr. Eleanor Fleming, a GSDM alumna, who spoke highly of the supportive nature of the institution.

“Every institution is going to teach you what you need to know, but it’s the context in which you’re getting that degree or certificate that makes all the difference,” said Williams, who is pursuing both a CAGS and a Master of Science in Dentistry in Dental Public Health at GSDM.

A record-setting number of GSDM faculty turned out to participate in thought-provoking discussions on racism and discrimination during a recent faculty development day. Nearly 100 faculty members attended this year’s Faculty Development Day on “Race, Racism, Discrimination and Disparities in Oral Health in America.” According to GSDM Faculty Development Director Dr. Neal Fleisher, discrimination is an overarching issue that affects every aspect of society –including oral healthcare – and it is important for the school to foster safe platforms for diverse voices to articulate their experiences, so that all faculty can learn and grow.

“Race, racism, discrimination, that is a power-packed couple of words, and it’s often a difficult conversation...” Fleisher said in his opening remarks. “People become very offended by it. People become very defensive about it. And today, we’re going to try to tackle it a little bit. We’re going to be talking about things that are going to make people uncomfortable, everybody, to one extent or another. If we ever want to move forward, we have to at least put things on the table.”

In his opening remarks, Dean Cataldo Leone thanked everyone for attending and applauded the high attendance.

“Our Faculty Development Days are a wonderful opportunity to connect and grow together as a community,” Leone said. “I’m gratified by the record-setting turnout for this important session on disparities in oral healthcare. It gives me hope that we are taking the necessary steps – and doing the hard work – to make oral healthcare more accessible and inclusive for all our patients.”

Five speakers – a mix of internal and external – gave presentations that touched on a wide range of issues related to the day’s theme, including access to healthcare, health disparities, and social determinants of health, and then the day concluded with a panel discussion.

During that discussions, panelists were asked to provide two words to describe how they felt about the day’s topic. Together, they came up with: heavy, hopeful, challenges, opportunities, mindfulness, understanding, community, and inclusion.

Fleisher said he hopes faculty members came away from the day with an awareness of their bias and an increased understanding of how to talk about these topics.

“I think it’s a topic that needs more discussion,” Fleisher said. “And I don’t, in any way, think that I’ve fully accomplished it today or that we have accomplished it completely today; accomplished means to be able to say that there’s some concrete change that has occurred, but we need to start somewhere with it and do more than just superficial talk… We need to really delve into it. I think today was just breaking the surface, just starting to get in the direction that we need to go.”