Applicant analysis: 2000 entering class.

There were 7,770 applicants to the entering dental school class of 2000. This is almost 14 percent less than the number of applicants to the entering class of 1999. Since the peak of dental school applicants in 1997 (at 9,829), the number has declined 21 percent. (This is most similar to the decline that has occurred in medical school applicants since their peak of applicants in 1996, at 46,968.) Almost 55 percent of the applicants to dental school were enrolled in 2000. Dental schools reported 4,234 first-time, first-year enrollees in 2000. This is an increase of 25 enrollees over the number reported in 1999. Since 1989, when dental school enrollment once again began to increase, total first-year dental school enrollment has increased 8.7 percent. The number of applicants per first-time, first-year position was 1.84 in 2000. It was 2.14 in 1999. (The most recent low was 1.34 in 1989.) The GPA and DAT scores of the first-time, first-year enrollees in 2000 were all either equal to or slightly higher than they were in 1999. Women were approximately 40 percent of the applicants and first-time, first-year enrollees in 2000, up slightly from 1999. Underrepresented minorities comprised slightly over 12 percent of the applicants and 10.6 percent of the first-time, first-year enrollees, also up slightly from 1999.