- Joined
- Sep 24, 2004
- Messages
- 148
- Reaction score
- 0
If you are like many dental students, then you probably paid something on the order of $400 to join ASDA for 4 years; and if the statistics are to be believed, about 80% of us will remain as members of the ADA upon graduating (the AMA by comparison can only claim 20% of physicans as its own).
Before I joined up (peer pressure to do so not withstanding), I asked our ASDA preps "well what are these organizations doing with all this money on our behalf?" the answer I got was they are lobbying the powers that be to make life better for dental students and practicing dentists. The classic example given was that so we dentists do not end up like the pharmacists did, swallowed up by large corporations and robbed of our freedom to practice independently.
Then let me ask you this then:
Do you think ASDA and the ADA are doing a good job on your behalf?
Do they represent your interests as a student?
Last year the ADA gave the Republican Party 63% of its political donations, $1,175,848, and the Dems only 37% at $683,499. Since 1990, the ADA has given 55% of its donations to the Republican Party (~$7.5million). {Federal Election Commission, http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.asp?ID=D000000105&Type=P }
Is it any wonder than the recent Democratic push through the house to cut student loans left out us grad students?
I am not here to espouse any one political ideology, or one political party over another. What I do want to prompt discussion about is whether our "lobbyists" in Washington are serving our interests first as dental students and second as future dentists.
Ask your Reps:
1. What concrete action is ASDA/ADA taking on reducing the astronomical cost of dental education?
2. What does this loan burden do to the accessibility of dental care in the future?
3. What is being done to better organize AADSAS, and nationalizing regional board exams?
4. What is actually being done to maintain our independence as practicing dentists and how will it be affected by the coming movement towards nationalized/socialized healthcare?
Before I joined up (peer pressure to do so not withstanding), I asked our ASDA preps "well what are these organizations doing with all this money on our behalf?" the answer I got was they are lobbying the powers that be to make life better for dental students and practicing dentists. The classic example given was that so we dentists do not end up like the pharmacists did, swallowed up by large corporations and robbed of our freedom to practice independently.
Then let me ask you this then:
Do you think ASDA and the ADA are doing a good job on your behalf?
Do they represent your interests as a student?
Last year the ADA gave the Republican Party 63% of its political donations, $1,175,848, and the Dems only 37% at $683,499. Since 1990, the ADA has given 55% of its donations to the Republican Party (~$7.5million). {Federal Election Commission, http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.asp?ID=D000000105&Type=P }
Is it any wonder than the recent Democratic push through the house to cut student loans left out us grad students?
I am not here to espouse any one political ideology, or one political party over another. What I do want to prompt discussion about is whether our "lobbyists" in Washington are serving our interests first as dental students and second as future dentists.
Ask your Reps:
1. What concrete action is ASDA/ADA taking on reducing the astronomical cost of dental education?
2. What does this loan burden do to the accessibility of dental care in the future?
3. What is being done to better organize AADSAS, and nationalizing regional board exams?
4. What is actually being done to maintain our independence as practicing dentists and how will it be affected by the coming movement towards nationalized/socialized healthcare?