ENNEAD History

By Brandi R. Jackson and Kim Hammersmith

The ENNEAD Society of Dental Volunteers is a student initiative that encourages student-designed community service activities and promotes leadership among people who may not have been service-oriented in the past. The goal of the society is to equip students with the skills and passion necessary to be leaders in their communities upon graduation from dental school.

The idea for ENNEAD arose in 2003 when four UNC School of Dentistry students (Victoria Williams, Tara Pinder, Jonelle Grant, and Brandi Jackson) became frustrated with their peers’ apathy towards community service. It seemed as though a select few students at the school were doing the bulk of the community service work. With the encouragement of faculty advisor Dr. Eugene Sandler, the students brainstormed innovative methods to encourage other dental students to become more active outside of the dental school’s walls.

They proposed a course—DENT 499-E—that would encourage volunteer work by granting elective credit to students who completed a designated number of service activities in a given semester. In addition, they laid the organizational framework for the “Ennead Society of Dental Volunteers.”

The society took its name, ENNEAD, from an Egyptian word meaning “group of nine.” Nine student leaders, including the four founders, are responsible for taking requests from the community, designing projects to meet the needs outlined in those requests, and then organizing a group of student volunteers to carry out those projects. ENNEAD’s motto is “As Much Diversity as Possible.” The group of nine consists of students from all four classes, several ethnic and racial backgrounds, both genders, and a wide variety of service interests.

While the original group consisted solely of dental students, the group has now evolved to include dental hygiene and dental assisting students as well, comprising a diverse group capable of providing oral health promotion to their surrounding communities.

The group has coordinated several activities to date, including: providing dental screenings and fluoride varnish application at daycares and community centers, making mouth guards for a bike rodeo, providing oral hygiene instructions to nursing home employees and elementary and middle school students, providing information about tobacco use and oral cancer prevention, and educating elementary school teachers and nurses as to the proper management of traumatic dental injuries. ENNEAD has promoted the field of dentistry at elementary school career days, as well as at the UNC career fair. In addition, ENNEAD gives support and resources to UNC’s Hispanic Dental Association and has participated in several Latino health fairs.

ENNEAD can serve as a successful model in other communities and universities, and will be instrumental in developing leaders to address the oral health disparities that do indeed exist.

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