Posts Categorized: Events

2013 ASDA Annual Session – Atlanta, GA

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This year Andrew Sholudko, Ashley Phares, Chrissy Shaw, Viviane Trinh, Mike Gibilisco, Joseph Whitney, Sean  O’Brien, Kris Cooper, Lane Mahoney, and myself traveled to Atlanta to represent UConn at ASDA’s 2013 Annual Session.  On a national scale, it was a great experience to see how ASDA works to advocate for its members. Daily meetings with our district caucus helped identify the relevant issues and prepare the involved students for the election of next year’s ASDA Executive Committee.  Some of the major topics discussed this year were: who should define the quality of oral health care (specifically in reference to the issue of mid-level providers), the ethics of patient-based board examinations, and the effects of newly opening dental schools. If you are interested in reading more about ASDA’s current statements on policy, I would encourage you to visit their website: http://www.asdanet.org/statementsonpolicy.aspx.   It was exciting to learn how parliamentary procedure works in the House of Delegates Meetings, and how ASDA’s policy statements and bylaws can be amended.   On Friday night, ASDA held the third Annual Gold Crown Awards Ceremony to honor outstanding ASDA national leaders and chapters.  Congratulations again to our very own, Chrissy Shaw, District 1 Delegate of the Year!

 

Annual session was a fantastic way to network and learn more about dental schools across the country.  Several events were specifically designed to meet other students, especially students interested in pursuing similar specialties.  Additionally, ASDA  and its sponsors had organized countless small group seminars on relevant topics such as Digital Dentistry and the Future, Alternative Workforce Models, Getting Into a Residency (our very own Ashley Phares was a speaker!), and Managing Your Dental School Debt.  Outside of the ASDA events, we did have some fun traveling around Atlanta, especially visiting some great restaurants (shout out to Sweet Georgia’s Juke Joint), Centennial Olympic Park, the Coca-Cola Factory, and the Georgia Aquarium!

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Migrant Farm Workers 2012

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The Connecticut Area Health Education Center (AHEC) and the University of Connecticut have been working together to help the local migrant farm worker population in Connecticut. Due to numerous barriers, many migrant farm workers have little to no access to health care. To provide these workers with the care they need, UConn dental students set up mobile clinics for 3 hours during the evening at different farm sites in Connecticut throughout the summer. At these sites the workers have access to a medical clinic, dental clinic, health related educational information, and medication. At the dental clinic, we provide oral health screenings for the migrant farm workers and their families. In addition, we can provide fluoride varnishes for their children to help prevent cavities. After the screening is completed, the program will set up an appointment and arrange transportation for the families to dentists in the communities where they can go to receive free treatment such as cleanings, fillings, and extractions. These are really accessible accommodations for a lot of the patients we see at the clinic who have issues with getting to and paying for treatment. This is also an awesome opportunity for us dental students to learn from.
“It was a great experience!” said Khadija Khan, rising second year student. “I did my first oral exam on a patient. It’s nice to see things we just learned about in dental classes such as a receding alveolar bone in a denture patient.”

Annual Chill and Drill

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As the year continues, the second and first years have reached yet another mile stone. Our yearly Chill and Drill is coming up next week and we’re very excited! Since today was officially our last day of second year operative, we turned in our instrument kits so that the first years can inherit them and thus… the circle of life continues!
It seems like only yesterday that my classmates and I were eagerly awaiting a lesson on how to drill a Class I. This year we will be adhering to tradition and offering gift cards to first place, second place and the most creative winners! Of course, as always, we will have a plethora of goodies that the second years generously provide!

Wenhui Sun

ASDA Predental Outreach at Trinity and Yale

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Last week, UConn ASDA members traveled to Trinity College and Yale University to speak with predental undergraduates. At each school, students from all class years attended the presentations to hear our perspectives on the application process. We discussed their decision to pursue a career in dentistry as well as (more…)

Think n’ Drink Recap

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On behalf of the 2nd Year Reps and ASDA, we want to thank everyone for coming out to the social event at Murphy’s the other night. There was pizza and drinks galore! We were glad to have an event that was made solely to provide ASDA members an opportunity to relax and just chat over some free dinner! We had a great showing and we hope that more of you can stop by our next social event.

Whether you came to ask questions about OS1, to give advice about OS1, or (more…)