How tough is becoming a dentist?
It’s very tough. You have to work very hard in college, not just getting good grades, but you also need to have other things such as community service and leadership activities that will help you get into dental school. Getting into dental school in the US is competitive. On average, there are 7 qualified people applying for every seat that is available. Once you get into dental school, the course load is very demanding and you are learning lots and lots of new skills that you will soon use on actual people. If you have aspirations of becoming an orthodontist, you must do very well in dental school, recognizing that just about everyone in dental school is very smart and talented. Orthodontic residency programs in the US are very competitive. About 1000 people apply for about 300 seats every year, and the people applying are not all recent graduates from dental school. Some are practicing dentists, others are people from other countries. It’s not impossible, obviously, but you need to k
