Dr. R. Lamont “Monty” MacNeil has been reappointed to a third five-year term as dean of the UConn School of Dental Medicine.
A comprehensive University review led by the Office of the Provost determined the dental school has continued to excel in its missions of teaching, research, clinical care, and public service, as well as in national reputation and fiscal management, under MacNeil’s leadership.
“UConn is incredibly proud of Dean MacNeil, whose strong leadership of our prestigious dental school has contributed so much to its ongoing excellence,” said Susan Herbst, president of UConn. “We are thrilled that he is on our team, where he is championing innovation in dental medicine, research, and the education of the next generation of dentists.”
MacNeil joined the UConn School of Dental Medicine in 1998. Since his initial appointment as Dean in 2007, the school had two perfect accreditation reviews, meaning the governing body had no recommendations for improvement. Accreditations are done every seven years; the most recent was in 2015.
“In addition to the highly successful accreditation reviews, we’re most proud of the continued success of our academic programs, in terms of both residency programs and our predoctoral DMD program,” MacNeil says. “Just as important has been the sustained, steady growth of our research activities, including the recent formation of a new Department of Biomedical Engineering, which will have its primary physical home in the School of Dental Medicine. Along the way, with help from the Bioscience Connecticut project, we’ve been able to renew the facilities that support all of our missions and this will be a great asset for students, staff and faculty long into the future.”
Recruiting of faculty for the new Biomedical Engineering Department, now a collaboration of the UConn Schools of Medicine, Dental Medicine, and Engineering, is underway, and the first five recruits will be appointed as dental faculty. Ki Chon, professor of biomedical engineering in Storrs, has assumed the department head role for both campuses. The Farmington location will be on the sixth and seventh floors of UConn Health’s Laboratory (L) Building, adjacent to other dental school departments.
