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Dental Hygiene Entry-Level Traditional Program Requirements

In addition to the admission standards of the institution and the general admission requirements of the School of Dentistry, candidates seeking admission to Dental Hygiene's entry-level traditional program must:

• Have completed a minimum of 61 semester hours of academic credit (exclusive of physical education, military science, dogmatic religion and vocational courses) from a regionally accredited institution of higher learning;
• Have a minimum overall cumulative grade point average of 2.50 on 4.00 scale;
• Have completed 8 hours observation of a licensed or registered dental hygienist in two separate clinical environments;
• Complete an interview, submit a resume, and participate in a hands-on dexterity test;
• Submit ACT scores; Please note the Dental Hygiene program requires submission of all four ACT section scores, including the science section.
• Have completed 12 hours of the science prerequisite courses* and 24 of the non-science courses prior to the Feb. 1 application deadline to the program; and,
• Have successfully completed (a grade of C or better) the following minimum prerequisite number of required courses.

*One course in anatomy plus 1 course in physiology or anatomy and physiology combined for two courses

**Online Science Courses - Effective Fall 2025, online science courses will no longer be accepted to satisfy pre-requisites for the Dental Hygiene program. Online courses taken between Spring 2024 and Spring 2025 are acceptable to satisfy pre-requisites. Special consideration will be considered on a case-by-case basis.

***Behavioral Science electives should include Psychology and/or Sociology courses

****Recommended courses for general electives include courses such as Communications courses, Ethics courses, and/or Computer Applications courses.

None of the required courses listed, described or recommended above may be met by the following: courses in physical training; military science; dogmatic religion; mathematics or science designed for non-science majors or course credit granted without college-level training.

Program application deadline

All application documents and application fees must be received by the Office of Enrollment Management by Feb. 1st. In-person interviews are by invitation only for qualified applicants and are held the first Friday of March. General application information may be found in the General Application Procedures section of the School of Dentistry in the UMMC Catalog.

The following criteria are utilized in selecting students to the Dental Hygiene program:

• GPA
• ACT
• Interview and Resume Submission
• Completed required courses
• Observation form

 

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