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PORTLAND, Maine

Collyn Baeder gives presentation on Dental Careers Exploration Camp

Collyn Baeder, Coordinator for the School of Community and Population Health, was invited to present at the MELMAC Education Foundation's Peer Learning Session for College Access Programs on September 22, 2015. The audience consisted of guidance counselors from high schools across Maine. The presentation, titled "Making Summer Fun AND Educational for High Schoolers - Experience a Health Career!" was intended to provide the counselors with information about UNE's Dental Careers Exploration Camp as a resource for their students. Baeder coordinated the camp in the summer of 2015.

Baeder was joined by Lynwood McHatten, guidance counselor for Ashland District School, Lorri Brown, director of the Western Maine Area Health Education Center (AHEC), and Ellen Ridley, senior director of Foundation and Corporate Relations at UNE. McHatten has served as a camp chaperone for several years for students from Ashland and the surrounding area. He discussed the positive impact the camp has had on his students, several of whom are now planning careers in dental medicine and dental hygiene as a result of their camp experience. The Maine AHEC Network contributes funding to the Dental Careers Exploration Camp, and Brown joined to broaden the presentation's scope, providing information on other health careers and educational opportunities available to Maine high schoolers through AHEC-sponsored programs. Ridley discussed the important benefits the program’s funders have provided to Maine youth through their grants. In addition to the Maine AHEC Network, 2015 camp sponsors included TD Charitable Foundation and Time Warner Cable.

About the University of New England

The University of New England is Maine’s largest independent university, with two beautiful coastal campuses in Maine, a one-of-a-kind study abroad campus in Tangier, Morocco, and an array of flexible, accredited online degrees. In an uncommonly welcoming and supportive community, we offer hands-on learning, empowering students to make a positive impact in a world full of challenges. The state’s top provider of health professionals, we are home to Maine’s only medical college, Maine’s only dental college, a variety of other interprofessionally aligned health care degree programs, as well as nationally recognized programs for marine science degrees, natural and social sciences degrees, arts and humanities degrees, and business degrees.