The Factors Driving Higher Dental School Cost (and What It Means for Student Retention and Satisfaction)

This article is an extract from Immersify’s landmark white paper: ‘The Modern Dental Student 2025’. The white paper breaks down seven major findings drawn from a survey of 348 dental students. For the full set of actionable insights and recommendations on students’ expectations and unmet needs, download the report. 

How the Cost of Dental School Connects to Sector-Wide Concerns 

According to a 2024 report from Inside Higher Ed, The majority of university presidents in the U.S. (66%) are worried about reduced public confidence in higher education, which (in their eyes), can be attributed to a lack of affordability. And, crucially, 57% of presidents who said this also believed that concerns about tuition cost are either very or extremely valid.  

Dental schools certainly aren’t immune to this issue. Between 2012 and 2022, the American Dental Association’s Health Policy Institute reports tuition and fees rose from 32.9% of schools’ revenue to 43.1%, whereas patient care revenue remained consistent and government support declined. 

Clearly, these higher fees are needed: the cost of dental school from a student perspective is tied to stagnancy in the other revenue sources available to institutions. But at its extreme, this rise means that (as a 2025 article in the Journal of Dental Education argues), dental school cost may soon place an unsustainable burden on students. 

The reasons (and solutions) for this issue are many, varied, and complex, often falling outside the purview of individual dental schools. But that doesn’t mean institutional leaders should do nothing.  

While the ‘sticker price’ of dental education may need to remain in place, schools can (and should) shift their focus to the perceived value of the education and support they provide their students, ensuring that the experience on offer feels worth the price of admission. 

But how can schools make that assessment? What are the signs and indications that students are happy with their programs?  

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Satisfaction Metrics: Reassuring Student Retention Signals, or False Positives? 

For those schools that enjoy high internal student satisfaction scores, it might be tempting to assume that this particular hurdle has already been surmounted.  

After all, if students report a broad feeling of contentment with their program and their institution, it’s reasonable to assume that they perceive their program to be high value. 

But what if high satisfaction scores mask, obscure, or outright contradict the way students are really feeling?  

This is the key finding of our nationwide survey of almost 350 U.S. dental students. The Modern Dental Student 2025 shows that a broad consensus on satisfaction and confidence quickly shatters once students are prompted to reflect on any unmet needs they may have.  

Insufficient learning technologies, a desire for deeper skills development, and an appetite for new forms of structural support are threaded throughout the survey data, punctuated by language that points to a toll on the mental health and wellbeing of cohorts across the U.S. 

In short, there are two pictures here: one of a student body that’s confident and satisfied, and another that’s facing a string of needs that aren’t being entirely met. This introduces a notable risk. If students report satisfaction in spite of these unmet needs, how can institutions know whether learners feel they’re extracting the maximum value from their education? 

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The Student Attrition Risks of Hidden Dissatisfaction: Retention, Readiness, and Reputation 

Without heeding the unmet needs signposted among our student respondents, dental schools run the risk of failing to deliver the perceived value required to maintain strong student retention rates.  

Given schools’ ever-increasing dependence on tuition fees as the lion’s share of their revenue streams, coupled with the danger of pricing out some prospective students, this is an issue that could have significant commercial ramifications. 

But revenue isn’t the only issue at stake here. Like satisfaction, the data suggests that self-reported student confidence is quickly called into question when (for example) large volumes of respondents point to a clear desire for more hands-on skills practice. This is consistent with 2023 research published in the Journal of Dental Education suggesting dental graduates are under-prepared for practice across key areas. 

The barriers to increasing hands-on skills practice are often out of institutions’ hands: limited physical space and educator availability are universal problems across healthcare education. But students themselves, as our report uncovers, are pointing to ways they can be supported in terms of their practical preparedness. The challenge for institutions is both to embrace those student-centered solutions and to recognize that they may be necessary even if top-level metrics suggest all is well.  

The prospect of unprepared graduates poses a reputational risk which, when coupled with tacitly unsatisfied cohorts, lends real urgency to identifying and addressing the unmet needs at the heart of the student experience. 

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Dental Education Factsheet 

What Today’s Dental Students Are Really Saying 

The Modern Dental Student 2025 unpacks the unmet needs animating the central paradox of dental students’ claims to confidence and satisfaction.  

Read on to discover where current courses are lacking and how students are coping as they navigate this complex field, and walk away with a series of actionable recommendations for ensuring that satisfaction metrics match the way students actually feel. 

About the Report 

The Modern Dental Student 2025 survey was conducted to help universities better understand how students experience dental education.  

Encompassing topics from study behaviors and learner confidence to the resources that underpin student success, this report offers a far-reaching vantage point on the ways students engage (or fail to engage) with their programs, course content, and institutions. 

Almost 350 respondents participated in the survey, which took place in July 2025. These respondents represented a cross-section of D1-D4 dental students (~80%) together with students in allied, pipeline, and pre-dental programs (~18.5%) and a small minority of more advanced students (~1.5%) across dozens of U.S. institutions.  

Why It Matters 

Where most existing literature reflects institutional or faculty perspectives, this report joins the smaller number that focus on student voices: those who represent the key beneficiaries, commercial centers, and future clinicians at the heart of every dental school’s considerations.  

The report’s wide-ranging findings are intended to inform: 

• Curriculum planning 

• Technology adoption 

• Strategic investment in teaching and learning resources 

More broadly, The Modern Dental Student 2025 survey captures a set of tensions that should sit at the top of every institution’s list of priorities, as a general sense of satisfaction and preparedness sit alongside a clear desire for modernized resources and layered institutional support. 

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