CWG Response to SOD FC Feedback on Curriculum Blueprint

To: Faculty Council Members

From: Curriculum Redesign Core Working Group
   Jennifer Perkins, DDS, MD, Chair of Core Working Group
   Nejleh Abed, DDS, FAGD
   Rishabh Acharya, BDS, MDS
   Lisa Berens, DDS, MPH
   Benjamin Chaffee, DDS, MPH, PhD
   Elizabeth Joyce, PhD
   Barbie Klein, PhD
   Diana Nguyen, DDS

Re: Response to Faculty Council’s Curriculum Blueprint Feedback dated March 1, 2024

Date: April 2, 2024

The Core Working Group (CWG) of the Curriculum Redesign effort acknowledges and thanks the Faculty Council (FC) for the written feedback provided in their communication dated March 1, 2024. It is evident that the Council has invested considerable effort and that they have thoughtfully and thoroughly evaluated the Blueprint, which we very much appreciate. It is reassuring to know that the Council is enthusiastically supportive of the Curriculum Redesign effort and the 50+ individual contributors to the Blueprint, and that there is consensus that creating a new DDS curriculum is a worthwhile and necessary endeavor for the faculty of the School of Dentistry (SOD).

We have each independently and collectively reviewed the Council’s written feedback and have generated the following consensus responses. We understand and appreciate that these recommendations are intended to improve the Blueprint, and that they are provided in good faith. We are incorporating FC feedback into what we believe will be an improved Blueprint, and hope that this response allows Faculty Council to move forward with confidence.

The following are the consensus responses of the CWG to each specific recommendation.

Recommendation #1: The 2023 Blueprint would be strengthened by directly referencing the 2016 Shaping our Future report.

We acknowledge the work done by the five faculty members of the Curriculum Steering Committee in generating a new DDS curriculum in the 2016 report. The Chair of the CWG was one of the five faculty who worked on that effort and co-authored the 2016 report, and hence has direct knowledge of the work and the report.
We note that all the members of the CWG for the current Blueprint had access to the 2016 report and informed current efforts in that way, and we agree that it should be acknowledged in the Blueprint. Importantly, the CWG explicitly wanted to develop an independent vision that was built on current stakeholder analysis and objective sources of feedback, as detailed in the Blueprint report. We also developed our own robust process and identity while responding to present circumstances and opportunities.
To ensure that the Blueprint contains a more complete picture of the history of curriculum revision and interval developments in the SOD and society that will impact the new curriculum, a description of the 2016 curriculum revision project will be added in a new section. This new section will provide historical perspective on the era between 2004 and the present.

Recommendation #2: The 2023 Blueprint would be strengthened by describing how the environment has changed since Shaping our Future and indicate how the 2023 Blueprint addresses/connects to these changes.

The CWG will adopt this recommendation and will address it in the new section described in the response to Recommendation #1.

Recommendation #3: The 2023 Blueprint would be strengthened by directly referencing the SOD’s commitment to serving the public of California and beyond.

The CWG strongly agrees with this recommendation and thanks the Council for identifying this gap in the narrative. The Blueprint will be edited to include the suggested reference.

Recommendation #4: The 2023 Blueprint would be strengthened by expanding the vision of the dental graduate.

The information detailed in the vision of the dental graduate was taken directly from faculty, staff, and student feedback obtained from the 2022 Visioning Retreat and the direct surveys conducted during Blueprint development. The vision was intentionally meant to represent the totality of stakeholder input from these sources, rather than the opinions of the members of the Core Working Group. The CWG did refine, edit, and group the data obtained from the aforementioned sources, but did not meaningfully change what was meant to be a representative vision. Changing the vision of the graduate now would be a departure from the established process.
However, the CWG does acknowledge that the next phase of the redesign should clearly elaborate on the specific areas noted by the Council, including how the new curriculum will address oral health disparities, anti-oppression work, and the role of our graduates in shaping the future of dentistry.

Recommendation #5: The 2023 Blueprint would be strengthened by mapping the curricular domains to the SOD competencies to validate the domains, identify overlaps, and spark innovation and creative thinking.

The CWG, as a group of educationalists and content experts, concur with the Council that curriculum mapping is an essential part of any curriculum effort. The current curriculum redesign effort has always included a plan for producing a detailed and exhaustive curriculum map in Phase 3. A successful curriculum mapping effort will require much more granular information than the Blueprint, as a vision document, contains.
The CWG invites members of Faculty Council to partner with the CWG during the mapping of the new curriculum to competencies and accreditation standards, which will co-occur with the creation of integrated content blocks, courses, and defined teaching and assessment plans in the next phase.

Recommendation #6: The 2023 Blueprint should clearly state what is innovative about the proposed new curriculum.

The CWG accepts this recommendation and will add language about innovative elements to the existing Blueprint.

Recommendation #7: The 2023 Blueprint should provide more detail about the planned expansion of Community Based Clinical Education to 18 weeks of externships.

The CWG understands the concerns about the expansion of externships enumerated in the Council’s written feedback. The effort to create an expanded externship program while ensuring the highest quality educational experience for students, both while they are on externship and when they return to Parnassus, is an area of active development for the CWG. The desire to define the externship program more fully in the Blueprint is understandable. However, the CWG affirms that we must develop the CBCE expansion in concert with all the other elements of the clinical education program and the D4 year of the curriculum to ensure full integration, and a student-centered approach to a cohesive D4 experience.
Additionally, this effort must include input from stakeholders not already engaged in this effort, including meaningful participation from our externship site directors, all of the Group Practice Leaders, and the D4 Course Directors. Additional consultation will also occur with current students, residency program directors, and our alumni as prospective employers for graduates to ensure that the fourth year of the curriculum optimally prepares our learners for success in the next phase of their career.

Recommendation #8: Increased participation by Faculty Council in the next phases of the curriculum revision work.

The CWG welcomes increased participation by the Council’s members in the next phase of development and supports shared governance. We look forward to successful collaboration.

The Core Working Group again thanks the Faculty Council for its detailed and thoughtful feedback. We will generate language for inclusion in the existing Blueprint as detailed in the responses above, and we look forward to working together to ensure that the recommendations that are not implemented at this time are meaningfully addressed in the next phases of curriculum development.