The baccalaureate degree dental hygiene program administrator: A study of role expectations
Abstract
Quite often, dental hygiene program administrators accept that role without leadership preparation, without a vision for creating tomorrow's program, without a clear understanding of what it takes to develop a productive department, without an awareness of the demands on one's academic career and personal life, and without an adequate knowledge of the position's expectations. The purpose of this study was to examine role expectations of the dental hygiene program administrator in four year baccalaureate degree granting colleges and universities as perceived by the dental hygiene administrators, the deans, and faculty in those institutions. The population for this study was the dental hygiene program administrators, deans, and faculty members from the 25 (not including Marquette University) baccalaureate degree-granting dental hygiene programs in the United States for a sample total of 75. The questionnaire consisted of 65 job activity statements, or role expectations, for program administrators. The activity statements were divided into six administrative categories: (1) production activities--those which result in task accomplishment and product outcomes; (2) maintenance activities--those which preserve the department through recruitment, indoctrination or socialization, and rewarding and sanctioning; (3) production supportive activities--those which focus upon procurement of materials, manpower, and product disposal; (4) institutional supportive activities--those which obtain social support and legitimation for the department within the college and local community; (5) adaptive activities--those which insure departmental survival in a changing environment; (6) managerial activities--those which control, coordinate, and direct human and physical resources. Analysis of the data revealed no significant difference among the responses of the program administrators, deans, and faculty members of the production, maintenance, institutional supportive, adaptive and managerial activities on the questionnaire. A significant difference among the responses of the deans and the faculty members did exist for the production supportive activities category. Overall, the program administrators, deans, and faculty perceived the role expectations for the program administrator in much the same way with the one exception of the deans and faculty in the area of the production supportive activities category.
This paper has been withdrawn.