Carlos Serrano Petrillo (DDS Prostho MSc PhD©) is a Researcher and Teacher at ACTA and an Assistant Professor of the Restorative Dentistry Department at Universidad de Concepción in Chile. His research aims to assess and enhance the transition to clinical training in Dentistry from a curricular and a technological point of view.

With a Master degree in Medical Education for Health Sciences, 12 years of experience in clinical teaching and a specialization in Prosthodontics, his present focus is on the development and implementation of virtual reality to further increase safety of patients, students and teachers during clinical training at ACTA.

"I am very grateful to receive the ADEE 40th Anniversary Scholarship Award. This is a rewarding recognition of our research project and its potential."

Carlos chaired the 2016 new Special Interest Group (SIG) “Transition to Clinical Training in Dentistry”, that aims to gather international views and experiences regarding the interaction between preclinical and clinical training in Dentistry. The final goal of this SIG is to achieve a better understanding of the interaction between these stages within dental curricula. The attendants of the first meeting in Barcelona came from different dental schools worldwide and participated in group discussions preceded by presentations about experiences regarding the diagnosis of the “gap” in dental training and intervention strategies to narrow it.

"ADEE’s support and open platform for new projects are an encouragement to keep working for the development of dental education. The opportunity to chair a SIG for a new researcher as me is an endorsement for young researchers to share their projects internationally."

Dr Cesar Orsini qualified in 2009 with a DDS from the University Andres Bello in Chile. Since then, he has been a part-time undergraduate dental tutor teaching in subjects such as oral surgery, oral anaesthesiology and biostatistics. He holds a Masters degree in Education and recently achieved the status of Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and Fellow of the Recognising Excellence in Teaching Programme by the Learning and Teaching Centre of the University of Glasgow.

Currently, as a Doctoral Candidate in Health Professions Education at the School of Medicine, Dentistry and Nursing of the University of Glasgow, Cesar has developed his interest in the scholarship of Health Professions Education by building and maintaining an active research portfolio in collaboration with British, Spanish, Japanese and Chilean scholars, which is currently oriented towards academic motivation, quality assurance and behaviour change.

Cesar was honoured and delighted to receive one of ADEE’s 2016 40th Anniversary Scholarship awards to support the completion of his doctoral thesis. The support from ADEE has also enabled him to further disseminate his research by presenting at international conferences and supporting the publication of a number of manuscripts derived from his doctoral work.

The doctoral research conducted by Cesar is based on Self-determination Theory and it is focused on testing different educational determinants, such as autonomy-support and quantity and quality of feedback, and how these influence dental students’ academic motivation. In turn, this research also analyses how students’ motivation influences different educational outcomes, such as study strategies, performance, self-esteem and vitality.

Having the support from ADEE will enable Cesar and his research team to continue analysing and understanding the process of motivation in dental education and to possibly design interventions that impact students self determined motivation and their overall academic wellbeing.

I am a Clinical Lecturer at the School of Dentistry, University of Leeds and have been involved in educational roles in Leeds since 2003. 

ADEE is a source of inspiration, encouragement and feedback and I am hugely grateful to have been awarded a 40th Anniversary Scholarship.  I am grateful that this award recognises both past achievements and future development plans.  I have been attending ADEE conferences since 2005 and have presented posters in relation to communication skills, integrated ethics teaching, student research projects and feedback approaches as well as receiving an early career educator award in 2009.  I have been able to meet dental education colleagues from across Europe and beyond to exchange ideas and experience.

The scholarship award will help to support my PhD research which aims to develop practice-informed and collaboratively produced leadership education for undergraduate dental students.  This uses an entirely qualitative methodology and I have been working with academics both inside and outside of dentistry to challenge the assumptions our profession has about leadership and leadership education.  It has also made me challenge my own views about the philosophy that underpins education and its aims.  I look forward to reporting back on my work.

"Receiving the ADEE 40th Anniversary Scholarship Award is a real honour, I feel extremely privileged to have been awarded it, and thank ADEE for its continued support of the advancement of Dental Education, through this and its many other ventures.

I have been working in dental education since 2007 having been a full time clinician since 1994. The leap from clinician to educator was certainly facilitated by attending ADEE conferences every year from the start of my education career, and being fortunate to be chosen to present posters and oral presentations on a wide range of pedagogic areas and scholarly projects, as well as contribute and be involved with the law and ethics SIG.

As lead for the final year of the BDS programme at Peninsula School of Dentistry in Plymouth I am responsible for the curriculum as students’ transition from undergraduates to professional colleagues. I am also lead for professional development and student feedback for the whole Dental School and as a result of this am investigating the concept of ‘capability’ as opposed to ‘competency’ with a medical colleague (Ottawa conference 2016 and publication in Medical Education). The complexity and interaction of these various roles really led me into my PhD which is investigating what ‘management and leadership’ means to primary care dentists out in the real world of clinical practice, and how we can use this information to inform our education and assessment of these areas authentically.

My study utilises ‘Video Reflexive Ethnography’, which is a fairly recent methodological development in healthcare research, and the award has enabled me to buy small and unobtrusive recording equipment to facilitate the recording of dentists’ clinical sessions in practice, as well as enable me to bring my findings to ADEE in the future. The invaluable support of ADEE, through its conference presentations, groups and networking opportunities, as well as its publications has been instrumental in my own personal and professional development; and this award in particular has enabled me to undertake research that has potential to significantly contribute to the education of dentists throughout Europe in the future.

I feel humbled to have my name among the winners of this award, and look forward to hearing about their amazing developments as well as sharing my own over the next few years."

"I am one of the two recipients of “ADEE 40th Anniversary Scholarship Award” in 2014. This is an absolutely great and unique initiative by ADEE to recognise and support research in Dental Education. ADEE continues to provide an ideal platform to promote dental education across Europe and beyond.

Over the last 4 decades, ADEE has played a pivotal role in developing education in European Dental Schools and has been instrumental in developing contemporary undergraduate dental curricula and evidence-informed competency frameworks for European dentists. Furthermore the Association provides a highly prestigious stage for dental educators and researchers to gain international recognition for which it deserves immense appreciation.

My PhD research aims to explore and conceptualise preparedness of dental graduates through a systematic inquiry with a range of stakeholders in dental education using mixed methods. The 1st phase is based on qualitative methods and aims to dissect the concept of preparedness and identify the essential attributes of preparedness. The 2nd phase involves quantitative methods and focuses on developing a valid and reliable scale to measure the preparedness of dental graduates using the Rasch model.

On a personal level, I am hugely thankful to ADEE for recognising the value and potential of my research and truly appreciate their kind support. I am positive this award will encourage other dental professionals to engage in dental educational research and help the cause of dental education to further improve educational practices. Ultimately, enhancements in dental education and training should translate into improved standards of patient-care and benefit our communities and public at large."

Dr Laura Freedman has been a part-time undergraduate dental tutor for almost 10 years ever since qualifying with a BSc in Dental Science from Trinity College Dublin in 2006. Having always been interested in teaching, she commenced a Masters programme in Medical Education through the University of Dundee with her special interest lying in the area of Problem Based Learning (PBL).

Being self funded, Dr Freedman was delighted to be awarded a scholarship from the ADEE as it has enabled her to go forward and complete her Masters research project, which is both qualitative and quantitative in style.

Dr Freedman’s research is currently underway within the Dublin Dental University Hospital and Trinity College Medical School and is focused on building the necessary information required in order to design and implement a PBL skills course for undergraduate students. Through a combination of personal teaching experience, literature and focus group findings, so far Dr Freedman has concluded that undergraduate dental and medical students often progress through a PBL curriculum not fully grasping the PBL concept, relying on a surface learning approach and focusing too much on the small detail. This can result in student frustration and PBL failure. This coming academic year, Dr Freedman aims to investigate the effect that a deep learning approach has on exam results and to then use all of the information gained so far to design and implement the skills course for undergraduate dental students. It will be interesting to see if this skills course leads to an improved PBL student experience and exam performance.

Valentin Garyga is a dental student at the "Claude Bernard" Lyon 1 University, Lyon, France. He also studies public health and biostatistics part-time. His main fields of interest lie in periodontology, clinical research and health economics. Being very committed in student organizations, including the European Dental Students Association (EDSA), he focuses particularly on students’ access to research and on European policies in the areas of higher education. He notably chaired the workgroup in charge of writing the EDSA Policy for Dental Education in Europe, a synthesis of 49 propositions for improved dental education (EDSA, 2015).

Valentin and his colleague Florian Pochelu were awarded the ADEE Futudent scholarship for the GoPerio research project. This project tests the hypothesis that custom videos about toothbrushing and interdental brushing, made available to the patient via a cloud system, will lead to a better plaque control. GoPerio aims at increasing patient compliance with simple psychological interventions and adopts modern technologies to ensure efficiency and ease of use. In close collaboration with a multidisciplinary team of clinical researchers, a pilot randomized clinical trial was designed and scheduled to pave the way for a more robust, multicenter trial. Details will be unveiled at the ADEE 2016 Annual Meeting in Barcelona.

Being awarded the ADEE Futudent scholarship means a lot to Valentin and Florian. Receiving support so early in one’s career is a strong incentive to work harder and harder to contribute to the dental education community. Being students, this award is also a very positive opportunity to get actively involved in a research project and it offers the chance for other students to join in the making of this trial. This award has helped create enthusiasm for clinical research and Valentin, Florian and the team will keep on working to scale up the GoPerio project.