The demand for dental services is high, due in part to increasing numbers of cosmetic procedures in oral health, the influx of immigrants needing care and the aging of America, Bertolami pointed out. The dental school itself has 14 dental clinics, which are not part of UCSF Stanford Health Care, and sees about 135,000 patients per year, Bertolami noted. Jane Norbeck, who has served as the dean of the School of Nursing through the transition of four chancellors over a decade, announced last year that she will step down from that post to return to research and teaching this summer. About half of the PhD and postdoctoral students enrolled are women, according to Cliff Attkisson, dean of the Graduate Division, a program started 35 years ago. They already are a vast proportion of the students on campus, even if we factor out the School of Nursing.
Women are a plurality in all of our programs.
Some 44 percent of UCSF's dental students are women, reported Bertolami. This is a major advance. The medical school has seen a 31 percent decrease in the numbers of underrepresented minorities enrolled in the first-year class since then, Boyden said. Asked why students want to come to UCSF for medical education, Boyden said that cost, location, quality of the programs and diversity of people are the top reasons. The diversity of its student body and patient population was also considered a strength when the School of Medicine was last accredited in 1996, she noted.