I agree, be yourself. I have had a very checkered past, good and bad (only good for the past seven years). In addition I am older and have three kids. I thought that this would all be strikes against me. In the end I decided to be 100% honest, by doing so I was more relaxed and had great interviews and got accepted to my top 3 choices. The year before I had applied just to see if I could get in without my batchlors and I had tried to only highlight my good points, I wrote my letter according to all the books on how to write a great letter, I interviewed like all the books said to interview. I believe in the end it made me look like everyone else and they saw right through it.
So, just relax, you know what you want, and they just want to make sure of that. Dental schools do not want to give a seat to someone who might quit if they do they lose four years of tuition and there is one less dentist to take their place when they want to retire. Prove to them that you won't quit by being honest.
