Graduating dental students' views of competency statements: importance, confidence, and time trends from 2008 to 2012

Competency documents are used in dental education as both an educational framework and an accreditation instrument. The aim of this study was to analyze the perceptions of graduating dental students at the University of British Columbia (UBC) regarding the importance of each competency statement, as well as to assess their confidence in their abilities associated with each statement. The instrument was based on the survey developed by Schönwetter et al. at the University of Manitoba using the Association of Canadian Faculties of Dentistry competency document. The current study surveyed UBC graduating students in the years 2008 through 2012. The response rates ranged from 66.7% to 95.9%, averaging 77.5% across all five years. The results showed that, overall, the students rated all the competencies as important, but they rated their confidence lower than the perceived importance. Correlation coefficients averaged a moderate correlation of 0.376 for all competency statements except the five with the greatest discrepancy between perceived importance and confidence. The competencies the students perceived as most important tended to be associated with tasks frequently performed during predoctoral dental education. The instrument used in this study can help other academic dental institutions identify patterns of students' perceived competency importance and confidence to inform allocation of teaching time and resources and adopt new methodologies to address identified areas of need.