“Right now, we have an extreme shortage of dental hygienists and it’s really impacting our dental practices.”
Holli Seabury is executive director of the Delta Dental Foundation. She tells us an associate’s degree can cost more than $22,000 and more than $36,000 for a bachelor’s degree. Delta Dental’s philanthropic arm wants to defray the costs, awarding nearly $350,000 to 36 dental hygiene students in Michigan, Ohio and Indiana, including those attending Ferris State University and Grand Rapids Community College.
“We had a lot of dental hygienists leave the field during COVID and they didn’t come back.”
Seabury says that, coupled with the high number of hygienists nearing retirement age, is creating more openings in the field.
“We hear from so many hygienists that they want to retire but they can’t because they don’t want to leave their practice without a hygienist and they’re just hanging on, waiting for someone to be hired.”
More information about the scholarship can be found here.
