I believe state board is comprised of a group of practicing dentists right? look at how many issues dentists can agree on together. Wreb and Adex are simply proposing solutions that in case states change their mind, students can still give them $$ to take these mannequin exams and they do not lose the market share.
Option 1: dental school deans can sign off on any dental students deemed competent. Problem with this is check and balance. Why there exists national board when the school can sign you off ensuring you have enough didactic knowledge. In a sense, the state boards do not trust dental schools to do this and hence they need an independent agency to validate this fact.
Some practicing dentists I saw posted (I did not ask) mention they feel the values of the fields are cheapened if you cannot pass a live patient board exam when you will spend the rest of your life working on live patients.
Option 2: every stateboard list on their website for licensure requirements. If you do not have what it asks for, you cannot apply for the license of that state. you cannot say you already pay for the mannequin based exam, how come the states do not accept it. Some states accept Wreb, some states accept ADEX, some states accept neither (Georgia). So far, no states changes their rules. I do not foresee them changing it anytime soon in 4-5 months.
Option 3: computer based case testing proposed is a joke to me. It is like NBDE part 2 all over again. It is created just to appease the pressing need of DS4 students. I don't see any point in this. This is a clinical exam. Nothing about this exam is clinical when it is held at a prometric.
I feel the most likely possibility is waiting out the pandemic to take the license because the boards do not want to set precedence to change regulatory laws to satisfy the pressing licensure need of a particular group of people (DS4 students in this case). Plus, I am sure a lot of dentist spoke out supporting this model-based non patient licensure exam, I am sure there are more dentists who oppose it but do not speak out.
The provisional license sounds like the more likely possibility but again, the regulations of such license can be confusing. Remember, there are around 20-30% of dental students in C/O 2020 who have already taken live patient ADEX/WREB. Do you want these students to outcompete you for a job because you hold a provisional license? or a model based license?
Just to clear the air, I am a DS4 myself having taken WREB on the last weekend possible before WREB cancelled all their following examinations. I am with you guys. I am stressed out also. But here are just the truthful opinions.