When Mark Wolff assumed the deanship of Penn’s School of Dental Medicine in July 2018, then-Penn President Amy Gutmann expressed her confidence that he would “bring this storied school to even greater heights.” 

Stepping into his new role at Penn after a yearslong career at New York University’s dental school, Wolff articulated a vision for the school that emphasized a positive internal culture, mentorship, and outreach to the local community.

Yet six years later — with the prospect of a reappointment to a second term looming — nearly a dozen current and former Dental School faculty alleged a declining quality of education under Wolff’s leadership. Many faculty cited a restructuring of clinical time and an increase in overall graduating class size, while several also described an administration dismissive of community concerns. One part-time faculty member alleged that the school took retaliatory action against his appointment after he criticized the direction of the school.

While several Dental School affiliates highlighted positive changes that Wolff has brought to the school — including an emphasis on expanding access to dental care for disabled individuals and strengthening student research opportunities — many expressed concern about the school’s values, reputation, and educational quality should Wolff be reappointed to another term, with his first term set to end in June 2025.

“I’ve been affiliated with Penn for close to 50 years now. And this really is the first time I really feel like it’s being dismantled,” one faculty member said. “What’s happening now is so fundamentally wrong that it really scares me that [the Dental School] will not be what it used to be.”

The criticism of Wolff’s tenure comes amid the typical reappointment process for school deans at Penn. In March, Penn announced the formation of a consultative committee to advise on whether to reappoint Wolff for another term. With his reappointment up in the air, The Daily Pennsylvanian contacted dozens of faculty members, students, and alumni at the Dental School to understand how his leadership has changed the school over the past six years — and how they would feel about a second term. Current faculty members spoke on the condition of anonymity, citing a fear of retaliation against their employment status at Penn.

Fewer clinical instruction groups, more students

In 2019, a review committee of faculty and administrators was formed to assess the Dental School’s clinical program and suggest improvements. The committee led the Dental School to implement several major changes to clinical instruction, starting during the 2020-21 school year. 

Several sources at the Dental School told the DP that, rather than benefiting students, the initiatives launched during Wolff’s tenure have had a detrimental effect on the quality of education — with various faculty members characterizing the direction of the school as “downhill,” “unraveling,” and “a race to the bottom.”

“[Wolff] is changing the school and the direction and how we teach, and it’s definitely not going to benefit the students,” one faculty member said.

One significant change following Wolff’s appointment was the reorganization of what are known as clinical instruction groups, or primary care units. Third and fourth-year dental students are placed into PCUs to gain experience directly serving patients. Previously, the Dental School had 12 groups of around 30 students, led by mostly part-time faculty. Under the new model, the administration reduced the number of PCUs from 12 to six. Correspondingly, the number of students per group increased to around 60 — generating concern that the change would result in less one-on-one attention to each student in each group.

In response to a request for comment, a University spokesperson wrote that the consolidation of student group practices was done “to replace part-time group leaders and to add full-time faculty to be leaders available to students five days a week.”

“The former group leaders became assistant group leaders, so the faculty/student ratio was improved,” the spokesperson added.

The school appointed six full-time faculty members to lead each group, including Vincent Mayher, a PCU director in the Division of Restorative Dentistry. Mayher told the DP that consolidating the groups was intended to calibrate instruction across PCUs to a similar standard. 

“[The groups] are not cookie cutter, but we’re pretty close. And we’re all on the same page, [so] it’s a lot less confusion for the students,” Mayher said. “I think it helps them with their confidence.”

When the change was announced, the school promoted the change as a way of providing students with “full-time access to their instructors to address questions, concerns, and treatment options.” However, according to six faculty members who taught both before and after the reorganization, having fewer PCUs has limited students’ opportunities to interact with faculty members. 

A dental specialist who has taught for decades at Penn told the DP that the change has resulted in “less personal attention” to students. They alleged that the new clinical group structure prioritizes generating revenue from procedures over properly teaching students how to complete procedures. 

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“It’s become more of a factory style of just churning out numbers and volume, rather than attention to learning the right way to do procedures,” they said.

A faculty member with over 10 years of experience at the Dental School agreed that the number of faculty hires has not been commensurate with the doubling of the clinical group size. As a result, she said, instructors are unable to provide as much individualized attention to students. 

“Not all students are made alike. Some need more attention, some need less attention,” the faculty member said. “And with groups that are so large, like it is now, it is fairly difficult to give them that attention.”

Mayher acknowledged that the student-to-faculty ratio under the newer structure is a “huge concern.” However, he said that the school sought to address the issue by increasing the number of clinical hours. The school’s clinic is now open from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. four days a week, while it previously closed at 5 p.m. 

He added that the school is making an intentional effort to hire more faculty.

“We made a full court press to bring more faculty into the school, we’re still doing that. It’s always good to have more faculty, and, you know, [if] somebody has to leave, then we’re quick to find a replacement for that,” he said.

‘More numbers, more numbers, more numbers’

The restructuring is emblematic of a broader reorientation of the school’s priorities toward expansion rather than education, several longtime faculty members said. They said the school is poorly equipped to handle a trend of growing enrollment over the last few years. 

When Wolff was announced as dean in 2018, the Dental School enrolled 584 DMD students total, according to the Commencement Program for that year. In the 2023-24 academic year, the school had 724 DMD students. Each year’s graduating class includes students enrolled in the Program for Advanced Standing Students, which allows graduates of non-U.S. dental schools to join Penn’s second-year class and earn a DMD degree in two and a half years, with the goal of being able to practice in the United States. 

A University spokesperson wrote in a statement to the DP that the Dental School’s enrollment has risen by 15% over the last six years. The increase was approved by the Commission on Dental Accreditation, an agency that reviews and accredits dental education programs across the country. 

“Penn Dental Medicine recruited 35 full-time faculty, including 24 standing faculty, maintaining or increasing the number of faculty in virtually every clinical department to improve the clinical teaching mission and account for the growth in the student body,” the spokesperson wrote. 

The Dental School still lacks the resources and teaching staff to accommodate the larger class size, one dental specialist who spoke with the DP asserted.

“There’s an overabundance of students, way too many students accepted … without really the true amount of faculty needed to support our mission,” they said. 

Before coming to Penn, Wolff held teaching and administrative roles at the NYU College of Dentistry. NYU Dentistry is the largest dental school in the country, with over 1,900 students across its programs. 

“When you try to replicate [NYU’s] numbers at a smaller institution in a smaller city, it doesn’t work, because you don’t have access to that facility size and ability to hire enough faculty,” the specialist said. “But it doesn’t mean that [Wolff] has curtailed his thinking to evolve with a more intimate, more holistic educational experience. Instead, it’s just more numbers, more numbers, more numbers.” 

A 2024 Dental School graduate — who was granted anonymity, citing a fear of retaliation — said that he and several other students raised concerns about the increased enrollment to administrators during his time at Penn, to little effect. 

“The perception is that [Wolff] has increased the class size to an amount that is beyond the capacity of the school,” the graduate said. “We’ve had meetings about it, and he just kind of brushes it off.”

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Biju Paul, a former part-time clinical associate in the Department of Preventive and Restorative Sciences, told the DP that he had repeatedly brought his worries about the student-instructor ratio to administrators. He felt that the Dental School was becoming a “corporate dental setting” that prioritizes completing a high volume of procedures over providing training for students. 

“[The Dental School] is a teaching institution first and foremost,” Paul said. “The education should be the priority. It’s not about gaining speed, or doing a lot of procedures.” 

Allegations of retaliation for speaking out against policies

While the school has held several meetings to hear faculty input, some school community members reported feeling discouraged by a lack of substantial policy changes following those meetings. One faculty member, who has attended multiple feedback meetings held by school administrators, described the sessions as “lip service.”

“With all the meetings [administrators] have held, we haven’t really seen much change from what we had complained about. So because of that, faculty morale is actually very low,” she said. 

Furthermore, multiple faculty members alleged that the administration has created an environment where employees are hesitant to speak out in fear of losing their position at Penn. 

“I don’t think anyone is real thrilled with the way things are going, but it’s almost like if you don’t like it, they make it seem like you’re dispensable,” one faculty member said. 

Paul said that he has sent multiple emails to Dental School administrators expressing his concerns about a faculty shortage and has shared his views with Wolff in a virtual meeting. 

In April — two weeks after the meeting with Wolff — Paul received a letter from Division Chief of Restorative Dentistry David Hershkowitz notifying him that the school had decided not to renew his contract. The letter did not provide a reason for the decision. 

Paul, whose employment at Penn formally ended on June 30, told the DP that he believes the decision came as retaliation for the criticism he brought to senior administrators over the alleged faculty shortage. 

In response to a request for comment on Paul’s employment, Hershkowitz said that such matters are confidential and referred the DP to University policy. 

“Personnel matters are confidential, and Penn Dental Medicine, like the rest of the University, scrupulously adheres to an anti-retaliation policy,” a University spokesperson wrote in a statement. 

A month later, 14 part-time faculty members sent a petition to the reappointment committee appealing the decision not to continue Paul’s employment at Penn. 

Around a week later, 143 members in the D3 and D4 student body signed a letter in support of Paul’s reappointment and sent it to Wolff and Hershkowitz. In the letter, students praised Biju’s teaching skills and raised a concern that his departure would worsen an existing shortage of clinical faculty at the Dental School. 

According to Paul, he met with Wolff to discuss the decision in late May but was not successful in contesting the decision not to renew his contract. 

Several faculty members also referred to a lawsuit filed against the Dental School and Wolff by a former school administrator. Todd Singer — who served as the Dental School’s assistant dean for intramural and extramural affairs from 2019-2021 — first filed the suit in 2022, claiming he faced termination in retaliation for raising a sexual misconduct complaint. Singer alleged that he was pressured to leave his job after he complained of “sexually explicit and harassing conduct” toward his assistant by the chair of the school’s Periodontics Department.

After the DP reported on the lawsuit, Wolff sent a message to student leaders at the Dental School addressing “important misrepresentations” and “baseless accusations” in the story, according to a February 16 email obtained by the DP. In the email, he reiterated that the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission had investigated the situation and concluded that Singer had “no probable cause” to support his claim of wrongful termination. 

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“The claims in the lawsuit are without merit and the matters alleged in the complaint have no connection to the reason Dr. Singer is no longer employed at Penn Dental,” Wolff wrote. 

Both parties filed a joint agreement on May 3, dismissing all claims against the dean. The law firms representing Singer and the University did not respond to requests for comment. Rodrigo Neiva, the department chair, remains in his position at the Dental School and did not respond to a request for comment.

An ‘empathetic visionary’

Despite their wider concerns about the school’s direction, several faculty members who spoke to the DP credited Wolff for his efforts to open dental care centers for patients with disabilities. 

In 2020, Wolff established a Personalized Care Suite to serve patients with conditions including autism, Alzheimer’s, and movement disorders. The space features a “quiet room” for individuals sensitive to light and sound, a wheelchair lift room, and other accommodations. Every DMD student receives hands-on experience at the center treating patients with a wide range of disabilities. 

Alyssa Greenberger, 2002 Dental School graduate and current president of the Penn Dental Medicine Alumni Society, praised Wolff for his leadership in opening the personalized care suite. 

“The fact that this is right there in the school for the students, it’s amazing,” she said. “It helps them become more complete dentists. It helps them when they go out in the real world. They feel confident that they can treat patients in this category because there’s not a lot of dentists who can.” 

Greenberger went on to describe Wolff as an “empathetic visionary” whose ideas are helping keep Penn at the forefront of dental education. 

In February, Wolff received the Woods System of Care Distinguished Service Award for his contributions in leading a partnership with Woods Services, a nonprofit organization in Pennsylvania that supports children and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The partnership resulted in the opening of a modernized Penn Dental care center within the Woods Services campus. 

The Dental School runs several other community health clinics throughout the Philadelphia area. Beginning in their third year, dental students spend one day a week providing care at the centers, aligning with accreditation standards that require schools to provide community-based learning opportunities. 

Esra Sahingur, associate dean of graduate studies and student research at the Dental School, praised Wolff for the growth of the school’s advanced degree programs. During his tenure, the school launched three new master’s degree programs, including a two-track master of oral health sciences program. 

Sahingur also highlighted an increase in student research opportunities. 

“Under the dean’s leadership, we were able to quadruple, actually, the students participating in research, [and] we were able to establish funds for student research through alumni relationships,” she said.   

Reappointment process

Per University policy, Penn must establish a consultative committee whenever the reappointment of a dean is under consideration. The committee on Wolff’s reappointment — which is chaired by Dean of the School of Policy & Practice Sara Bachman — consists of five Dental School faculty members, two students, and one alumnus.

The group welcomed input from community members via a designated email address through April 15. All standing faculty members at the Dental School had the opportunity to share their confidential views on reappointment directly with the president and provost. 

In a written statement to the DP, Bachman said that the committee has “spoken with many Dental School faculty members and encouraged input from all members of the Penn community.”

“These conversations are confidential as indicated in [the committee’s] charge, and the committee’s findings will be described in its final report,” the statement said.

According to Bachman, the committee plans to make a recommendation regarding Wolff’s reappointment by the start of the fall semester. 

One faculty member, when asked how he felt about the dean’s potential reappointment, told the DP that continuing Wolff’s administration would “undermine the basic sense of Penn Dental.”

“I’ve seen a lot of administrations come through, a lot of deans go through there,” he said. “And this really feels like they are destroying what Penn Dental really stood for.”