Fall 2001

AAOF:

Our profession is simply wonderful. I absolutely love the opportunities, the joys, and the challenges that orthodontics provides me everyday.

I look back on my 30 years of experience in orthodontics and feel honored to be a part of this specialty.

When I first entered practice I knew that I had made a wise choice, one that would enrich my life. I was active as a young professional in orthodontic politics and volunteer activities.

As both my personal and professional lives progressed, I chose to devote more time to practice development and family while "retiring" temporarily from the political and volunteer efforts of orthodontics. I still kept up my professional associations, did my continuing education, and enjoyed all the benefits and challenges our specialty has to offer.

Each year that passed I found the practice more enjoyable, the challenges more exciting, and the relationships and friendships that I made more invigorating. There were days, and there still are, when I wake in the morning absolutely amazed that I get so much enjoyment from my professional life.

In recent years, as my children matured and went off to college, I found that once again I could personally devote more of my time to orthodontic volunteer efforts. Since my "retirement" from these activities much has changed in our profession. Changes in government funding and other revenue sources have had a severe impact upon orthodontic education and research.

I attended dental school and my orthodontic residency in an era of big government spending, expanding schools, huge grants, and apparently no shortage of educators, professors, and department chairpersons. That has all changed, and our profession is in grave danger of literally being destroyed.

For many of us, when we were in college, we were probably more liberal than we are today, and as our practices matured we became more conservative.

Perhaps one of the things we begin to think about when we become more conservative is that there should be less government spending and involvement in both our personal and professional lives.

Now it seems much of the nation is thinking similarly, and our government has been trimming back its expensive habits day-by-day, year-by-year, and administration-by-administration. There is growing support for self-sufficiency and cost-effective decisions that reflect good economic policy.

These changes have resulted in an environment that requires our profession to support our needs from within. We must to find ways to increase the financial support of educators and encourage expansion of educational faculties. Educators and researchers are the essential life-blood of our profession. Without basic scientific research and without educators, how will it be possible for the legacy of our profession to be passed on to future generations? To put it simply, it can’t.

We must, on our own, develop the mechanisms to ensure that the financial needs of the core educational system of our profession are alive, strong, and progressive.

I truly believe that the AAOF is one effort by our profession to create a foundation to support these needs. It is certainly not the only answer; however it is a great beginning.

Each year this foundation makes numerous awards towards research, educators, and our professional enhancement. In fact, this year a new category, the Educational Innovation Awards, has been added and is designed to help educators and others in our profession to explore innovative ways of teaching using the latest educational technology to foster the transfer of information.

We have been fortunate that the government has not interfered greatly in our specialty, and I believe it is important that we do all that we can to keep our independence and freedom.Take time to examine what you have achieved as a part of our specialty. I am sure you have all enjoyed financial success and hopefully have enjoyed the wonderful personal rewards that come with every case we treat, every person we meet, and every relationship we establish.

I became involved in AAOF because it is one important way that I can contribute to our specialty, its continuance, its survival, and its future prosperity.

Ask yourself how important your specialty is to you and then decide for yourself whether or not you can make the pledge. A few years ago when I made my first pledge to the AAOF it was the pledge-a-case request. It was suggested that $2,500, which apparently was the average case fee a few years ago, would be a supportive and meaningful pledge. That pledge is still meaningful today.

I remember thinking when I considered that pledge: "After being in practice a few years, donating just one case fee to this foundation is almost embarrassingly insignificant in terms of my life and what I've enjoyed in orthodontics."

In recent years, after returning to political and volunteer involvement in the specialty and seeing our great needs, I decided to increase my pledge to a higher level. I believe I am very fortunate to be in the position that I am today, certainly due in major part to being in orthodontics. The opportunity to pledge at a higher level is both a privilege and an honor.

Take some time to evaluate your own feelings and love of our profession. Make a difference and contribute to the future success of orthodontics. Make a pledge and help ensure that what you enjoy will be here for your children and descendents.

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