said, “I actually felt that the other two American Indians were an asset to me because they knew what it was like to grow up on a reservation. I often joke with my husband when I commute to my job at Indian Health Services that I’m going into a different world because it is.” The three were able to confide in one another in a way that no one else could understand. Still, at times Bremerman felt isolated, saying she felt different than other students because she lacked some of the commonality many shared — a parent who had a practice, a well off family. Being different made her want to do more. Additionally, she says “ I think that my background got in the way at times – I had to miss some of my finals because I had to go back to Yakima to attend my brother’s court date. I had another source of stress while I was at dental school that nobody quite understood.” Rodriguez had this to say, “Fortunately, I felt that many of the leaders that I met in dentistry that were Hispanic were pediatric dentists. Do I see them as competition…not in my wildest dreams — they are my mentors, colleagues and friends.” By the time Dr. Greg Ogata was in dental school, the issue his father had faced was essentially reversed: there were too many Asians in competition for spots. “When I was in school they found many classes were becoming predominantly Asian, as they did at UC Berkeley. Those with the best scores and grades should have been enrolled, instead, they had to dial back the numbers to create equity for non-Asians, which left only the “super Asians” in classrooms and no space for other, high-achieving Asians.” Ogata
“I took every chance to exceed my requirements and clinical experiences to prove others wrong about diversity quotas. The power of involvement and performance helped me to transcend stereotypes.”
I became a citizen I was considered for the following year’s class.” Ogata initially planned to attend Washington University in St. Louis; but as they were driving cross-country, he and his wife, Mabel, stopped to visit friends attending University of Missouri Kansas City. While there, Ogata met with the Dean, who asked him if he would consider UMKC instead. Ogata explains, “Dean Reinhart liked Asian students because they did so well in school, and that’s why he accepted so many of them.” With Mabel’s blessing, UMKC became their new home. They lived in a housing project because it was all he could afford, and Ogata was in a small study group with other dentists, all Caucasian. There were only four Asian dentists in his class of 100, and all were from Hawaii. “Everything about the experience was positive for me,” says Ogata, “We worked together as a group, and I never felt that my race was a factor at all.” Mabel concurs, saying “Yosh graduated at the top of his class, and quite a few of his classmates credit him with helping them get through dental school.”
Competition
Reports have shown that minority students of the same race can feel in competition with each other, and we wondered if any of the respondents felt that way. Most didn’t, instead seeing fellow students of the same race as allies. Bremerman, for instance,
Dr. Tyrone Rodriguez
continues, “You hoped to excel in other ways – in the interview, your letters. We didn’t talk about it as a group, but we knew that we were in competition with other smart Asians. Once we were in the program, the playing field was leveled. We would often joke that even the last person in class became a doctor.”
Continuing issues
We wondered what the doctors thought the most pressing issues facing minorities are today, and we got an earful. Dr. Greg Ogata thought it was financing, regardless of a dental student’s race. Dr. Sakai is concerned about insurance companies dominating the industry, just as they do in medicine and pharmacy, gradually driving us more to the corporate form of practice. And, he’s concerned about the credibility of the training foreign doctors receive, saying, “We’re unfamiliar with their schools, the methods of teaching and the quality of the education they have received. It is like all prejudices – anytime someone does things differently than you or has different references, there is the tendency to wonder about their abilities. I have concerns about their morals and ethics with all young dentists – there is a heightened emphasis on making money as opposed to doing the right thing.” Dr. Ferguson, retired since 2001, still keeps his fingers on the pulse of what’s happening in Washington and the country. He says
th e wsda ne w s · issue 5, april · 2014 · www.wsda.org · 11
cover stor y a conversation about race and dentistr y
Howard University. He says, “The interesting thing about Howard that a lot of people don’t know is that we had people of color from all over the place. In my class of 90 people, 45 were women, and out of the other 45, only 20 were from the US – all the rest were from places like West Indies, Africa and all the other places of color around the world.” Howard is a community-service oriented school, where they instilled an understanding of the underserved and their needs, and made sure students were trained to provide whatever needs were required, rather than focusing on training specialists. Going to a predominantly Black school had many benefits for students like Titus, who says, “I am aware that I didn’t have to worry about race factors playing into things. I know that for other African American students at schools other than Howard and Meharry, it was definitely a factor in their education – they had to make sure they weren’t being singled out because of the color of their skin.” Because he had been born in Japan, Yoshitaka Ogata was denied entrance to the UWSoD (and others) but that changed with the passage of the McCarran-Walter Act which abolished racial restrictions in United States immigration and naturalization statutes going back to the Naturalization Act of 1790. The Act was life changing for Ogata, who says, “I was on one side one day, and on the other side the next, and it sure made a lot of difference in my life. It felt like a ton of bricks was taken off my back. One day I was getting letters that said we will only take our own, as soon as