Dental News - ADEA Releases Statement on Professionalism in Dental Education

Search Dental Tribune

ADEA Releases Statement on Professionalism in Dental Education

Dental education needs more professionalism, the ADEA says. (DTI/Photo Yuri Arcurs )
 Lesley Ward, USA

Lesley Ward, USA

Fri. 17 July 2009

save

WASHINGTON, DC, USA: The American Dental Education Association (ADEA) has released a Statement on Professionalism in Dental Education for the academic dental community. Aligned with existing codes of ethics and conduct within the dental education and dental practice communities, the Statement is supposed to help define expectations for professional behaviour in dental education institutions. It includes the values and behaviours that should guide students as they enter the dental and allied dental professions and faculty and administrators as they continuously improve their educational programmes.

"The ADEA Statement on Professionalism in Dental Education reflects ADEA’s commitment to promoting ethical behaviour throughout the dental education community," said ADEA President Ronald J. Hunt. "The guidelines will help institutions develop and enhance their own codes, based upon a shared understanding of professionalism and academic integrity."

Promoting ethical behaviour throughout education and practice is among the most important challenges facing dental education today. In March 2008, the ADEA House of Delegates created an ADEA Task Force on Professionalism in Dental Education and charged it with the development of an ADEA Statement on Professionalism in Dental Education.The Task Force, comprised of members of all seven ADEA Councils, worked to identify and clarify those personal and institutional values and behaviours that support academic integrity and professionalism in dental education and are aligned with the existing values and codes of the dental, allied dental, and higher education professions. Those values are competence, fairness, integrity, responsibility, respect, and service-mindedness. It was also recommended that “real-life applications” of these values be developed so the concept of professionalism is more easily understood and applied by individuals and institutions.

ADEA hopes that the Statement stimulates broad discussions about professional behaviour in dental education, provides guidance for individual and institutional behaviour within dental education, and in doing so supports professionalism across the continuum of dental education and practice.

(Edited by Daniel Zimmermann, DTI)

To post a reply please login or register
advertisement
advertisement