Kenia Rodriguez DMD 14 knows firsthand how impressionable preschoolers are—her earliest memory is from her own experience as a preschooler, where she remembers learning to wash her hands. Rodriguez, President of the BU chapter of the Hispanic Student Dental Association (HSDA), recently had the opportunity to create her own lasting impressions on children at the Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción (IBA) Preschool in Boston’s South End.
Rodriguez, along with Oral Health Promotion Director Kathy Lituri and pre-dental students Shenell Howard and Christopher “Jake” Ward, visited the school on Monday, February 10, 2014, for an HSDA-sponsored oral health promotion visit.
The volunteers visited three classrooms of about 18 students each, where they taught the children songs to sing while brushing their teeth and instructed them on how to recognize foods that are good and bad for teeth.
“It is always rewarding watching children get excited about brushing their teeth,” said Rodriguez. “Education and prevention is crucial and preschool is a great place to start.”
The purpose of HSDA is to provide a voice for Hispanic dental students at GSDM and promote the oral health of the Hispanic community in Massachusetts through improved education, prevention, and treatment.