Regents briefs for March 22, 2004

Monday, March 22, 2004 | 9:44 a.m.

Dental hygiene degree approved

The Board of Regents unanimously approved a four-year degree in dental hygiene at the Community College of Southern Nevada along with several other programs recommended by the Academic, Research and Student Affairs committee.

A handful of community college representatives erupted in applause at the vote, which make the dental hygiene degree the first bachelor's degree offered at the college.

Regents delay dental school plan

University regents spent more than five hours Friday questioning a proposed public-private partnership to open an orthodontic residency program in Las Vegas before sending the proposal back for revisions.

At the suggestions of Regents Doug Hill and Doug Seastrand, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas School of Dental Medicine must make several changes to the legal contract to better protect the university's interests and must ensure that the admissions process is "totally blind" to which students are preferred by the private company.

The Board of Regents voted 7-6 to allow the school to make the corrections and come before the board again for approval.

Dentists and orthodontists in Nevada have objected strongly to the proposed partnership with Orthodontics Education Ltd. because of fears that the company would interfere with the dental school's admission standards. The dental practitioners and some regents also expressed concern that the contracts OEC asked students to sign require students to agree to work seven years for the company in exchange for tuition costs, a yearly stipend and start-up costs for a practice.

Heart transplant study funded

University regents unanimously approved a $250,000 feasibility study for a heart transplant facility, but not without some regents complaining about how the University of Nevada School of Medicine received the money.

The study is the pet project of Assemblyman Morse Arberry, D-Las Vegas, who set aside the $250,000 and another $1.25 million for future planning of a heart transplant facility in an end-of-session capital projects bill in 2003.

The money and the stipulation to do the feasibility study thus came down as a Legislative mandate, and the regents were left in the position of either doing the study or returning the money.

Other institutions similarly received about $8 million in funding from the state Legislature for projects not approved by the board. One was a $500,000 security initiative for the Community College of Southern Nevada, and the alleged involvement of president Ron Remington and lobbyist John Cummings in attaining that last-minute money from the Legislature was one of many reasons given for their November removals.