The most recent round of thinking and planning for the curriculum began with the School of Dentistry's Faculty retreat in 1996, at which we agreed that the curriculum needed mending.
During the 1996-97 year, a Curriculum Planning Committee was formed and began to examine the existing curriculum.
At the Faculty Retreat in October 1997, the Curriculum Planning Committee presented a progress report to the faculty (the "Five Streams"), which was supportive of the plan. The Dean also spoke at this meeting of the resource implications of the plan and of the need to prioritize so that resources may be assigned to those initiatives having the highest priority.
During the 1997-98 year, the Curriculum Planning Committee was divided into five separate committees, one for each "Stream," each with its own chair. These committees developed a more detailed plan for consideration by the faculty. The elements of this plan were presented to the faculty as a whole in May of 1998.
At the Faculty Retreat in October 1998, the Curriculum Planning committee again made a presentation to the faculty. This proposal had more detail than the one made in the previous year, especially for the first two years of the curriculum (dental).
During the 1998-99 year, the Stream Chairs have continued their planning, and in the Winter and Spring quarters the plan has been discussed by the Educational Policy Committee in a series of six meetings. The proposal was also discussed by the Basic Sciences Coordinating Committee (BSCC, a sub-committee of the EPC) and the Curriculum Sciences Coordinating Committee (CSCC, also a sub-committee of the EPC). Both the CSCC and the EPC have voted to accept the reports presented to them on the proposed new curriculum, while recognizing that there is much work yet to do and that the plan will require resources for successful execution (faculty, administrative). The BSCC did not vote on the curriculum plan since it did not have quorum, but it did express collectively an enthusiasm for the plan.
In its current formulation, the curriculum plan represents a framework, a concept, a "work in progress." Its authors recognize that it would be inappropriate to refine the plan further without the participation of the individuals who are to lead the streams and by an individual appointed at the Associate/Vice Dean level who would have overall responsibility for the development and management of the curriculum. It will not be possible for these individuals to be hired or to devote sufficient time to curriculum planning without the expenditure of considerable resources, and so the next phase of the process should be for the faculty to consider the framework of the plan and to assign it a level of priority. If the Faculty is enthusiastic about the plan, it is anticipated that the administration, with assistance from the faculty, will be able to identify the resources needed, at which time the plan can be further developed.
