ATSU-ASDOH Student Dental Association hosts 2026 Prophy Cup
The American Student Dental Association (ASDA) chapter at A.T. Still University’s Arizona School of Dentistry & Oral Health (ATSU-ASDOH) hosted its annual Prophy Cup golf tournament on Saturday, September 12, at the Arizona Grand Resort in Phoenix.
The annual tournament is held in memory of Timothy Lukavsky, DDS, FSCD, former director of Special Care Dentistry and assistant professor at ATSU-ASDOH, who passed away in 2021. In total, students, faculty, alumni, and guests raised a total of $3,350 for the Arizona ALS Foundation.
Participants competed as teams throughout the tournament, with awards and additional activities incorporated throughout the course.
The event, held Sept. 18 at Performing Arts Center San Luis Obispo on the campus of California Polytechnic State University, marked ATSU-CHC’s fourth graduating class.
“Your tireless pursuit of knowledge, combined with your unwavering passion for serving the underserved, has set you apart as culturally proficient healthcare providers,” said Eric Sauers, PhD, ’97, dean, ATSU-CHC. “You have embraced the ideals of compassion, empathy, and social justice, recognizing that healthcare is not a privilege, but a fundamental human right.”
Addis, who delivered the commencement address, was elected to the California State Assembly in 2022 and represents Central Coast communities in San Luis Obispo, Monterey, and Santa Cruz counties.
Assemblymember Dawn Addis
Prior to her remarks, Dr. Sauers was joined by ATSU Chancellor Craig M. Phelps, DO, ’84, in presenting an honorary doctorate to Addis. ATSU recognized Addis for her leadership and public service, including her work to advance healthcare access, education, and the well-being of communities throughout the Central Coast.
“You’re here to help each and every person that you serve, not just with the healthcare that they need to survive, but with the healthcare that they need to thrive,” Addis told graduates. “You’re about to change our world for the better. Not just one person at a time, but one act of service at a time. And I will tell you, class of 2026, that the Central Coast, San Luis Obispo in particular, needs you more than ever.”
Additionally, Armando Soltero, MSPAS, PA-C, ’23, member, College for Healthy Communities Alumni Association, led students in the alumni induction.
Watch the full ceremony and view more photos below!
Preparing for board exams requires specialized review tools tailored to your discipline’s blueprint. The library provides access to top-tier interactive question banks and comprehensive review texts to ensure readiness for board exams such as the INDBE, NBCOT, ABA Praxis, ASHA Praxis, & the NPTE.
BoardVitals: Interactive INDBE Prep
Dentistry students can utilize BoardVitals to prepare for the Integrated National Board Dental Exam (INDBE). This platform delivers extensive, interactive question banks featuring up-to-date literature explanations, detailed feedback, and clinical case scenarios.
Registration: Sign up using your ATSU email address to create a personal account.
Verification: Click the automated confirmation link sent to your email to unlock ATSU-subscribed modules.
Sign-In & Tracking: Log in directly to BoardVitals anytime to track progress and complete practice sets.
Faculty Note: Faculty members can also build and assign practice modules to classes. Contact Hal Bright (hbright@atsu.edu) for assistance.
StatPearls: Specialized Board Review
StatPearls is a comprehensive learning platform featuring thousands of practice questions to help refine strengths and target weak areas through custom quizzes.
INDBE (Dental): Access dental question banks and use the Quiz Builder to practice field-specific assessments.
Navigate to StatPearls and register/sign in using your ATSU email address and password.
Select Question Banks from the left-hand menu, click Quiz Builder, and choose your specific field (Dental, Occupational Therapy, Audiology, or Speech-Language).
Use the performance and pre/post-testing analytics to monitor your progress over time.
Physical Therapy students have access to McGraw-Hill’s dedicated AccessPhysiotherapy platform, featuring resources curated specifically for the NPTE.
Review Text: Access McGraw Hill’s NPTE® Review by Annie Burke-Doe and Mark Dutton, complete with over 1,000 embedded Q&As across chapters.
Practice Exams & Quizzes: Use the top menu’s Study Tools drop-down to generate custom multiple-choice quizzes or take the 2019 Online Simulated NPTE Exam aligned with the official NPTE blueprint.
If you have any issues accessing any of these resources, please contact your liaison or libaz@atsu.edu.
In May, students assembled 50 care baskets for Mother’s Day for mothers of children served by CALM. As summer got underway, they built 100 summer kits for children and teens filled with snacks, toys, books, and activities to keep them engaged and learning during the break. And ahead of the new school year, ATSU-CCPA students also put together 100 back-to-school kits.
“Being involved with CALM has been one of the most meaningful parts of my experience at ATSU,” said Gabriel Estrada Urrutia, PA, ’27. “When I became community outreach co-chair with Angelo Joseph Bulahan, PA, ’27, I saw it as an opportunity to further connect with organizations already doing important work in the communities.”
“As a PA student, I think it’s easy to become focused on the clinical side of medicine, but these experiences have been a reminder that health is shaped further by what happens outside the exam room. A child’s environment, sense of safety, resource accessibility, and their support system can have lasting effects on their health and overall wellbeing. Being able to contribute, even in a small way, to an organization working to strengthen those areas has made my education feel even more meaningful.”
Estrada Urrutia added that service opportunities like this align with the CCPA program’s mission of preparing PAs dedicated to whole person care in the communities they serve.
“I am also very grateful that ATSU has given us opportunities to incorporate service during our education. Seeing my classmates come together to assemble kits was rewarding. Knowing that our class hopefully put a smile on the faces of these local children and families, made the organization and effort of these projects incredibly special,” he said.
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Our university library system has achieved substantial growth over the past fiscal year, marking a successful chapter in our 3D printing initiative since its inception. With the recent addition of a Stratasys F170 printer in Arizona and an F370 in Missouri, alongside increased utilization of our J55 Prime resin printer, the library has now produced a total of 58,274 models for students and faculty since 2015.
This past year alone accounted for 10,723 models across more than 37,000 production hours. Campus engagement also reached new heights through our multi-campus 3D printing contest, which encouraged creative and educational designs from students of all technical backgrounds. Congratulations to this year’s winners: Ishaan Patel (1st place), Nhi Do and Jamie Carroll (2nd place), and Joe Oberkrom, Kaylee Kappller, and Jacob Krauss (3rd place).
This productive year was made possible through the deep collaboration between Academic Technology, Anatomy, and the Library. Rather than serving as support staff, these departments operate as equal partners in this ecosystem. While the end products are stationed at the Library where we house the printers and coordinate with faculty, the program relies heavily on joint expertise. In particular, without Jamie Carroll’s knowledge, creativity, and contributions to the program, many of the 3D models would have required outsourcing. We also sincerely thank Clayton Furman, Michael Cramberg, Hannah Steele, Michael Shoop, and everyone who contributed to the essential pre- and post-processing work that keeps this service moving forward.
On both campuses, these expanded resources have allowed the library to become an essential partner in healthcare education. In Arizona, the 3D print service collaborated with Physical Therapy and Occupational Therapy faculty to create instructional models, including a femur and detailed developmental womb models, while also fabricating engagement tools like lecture fidget toys and items for youth community events. In Missouri, the team partnered closely with faculty and researchers on an extensive array of complex clinical tools—such as dental training teeth, intricate neurological and cardiovascular models, and historical reproductions for the museum. Furthermore, our teams successfully shared these insights and methodologies with the broader academic community by presenting at major library association conferences in Missouri and Baltimore.
Looking ahead, the library is prepared to sustain this momentum with a robust pipeline of upcoming projects. Future initiatives include working with academic departments to develop specialized ballistic gel models for injection training, creating advanced dental root canal models, and collaborating on a protocol to convert CAT and MRI scans into high-fidelity anatomical teaching tools.
Held at the Clark Center for the Performing Arts in Arroyo Grande, California, the ceremony included remarks from Jennifer Harrington, DMS, PA-C, DFAAPA, professor, chair, and director; O.T. Wendel, PhD, president, ATSU Arizona & California campuses; and Eric Sauers, PhD, ’97, dean and professor.
John E.H. Butler, MS, MPH, PA-C, ’23 regional director of physician assistant education, Community Health Centers of the Central Coast, and a graduate of the CCPA program’s inaugural class, delivered the ceremony’s keynote address.
Across the ATSU community, faculty and staff are all actively exploring how artificial intelligence can transform healthcare education, research workflows, and day-to-day administrative tasks. However, navigating the rapidly evolving landscape of AI tools can sometimes feel overwhelming and isolating.
The A.T. Still Memorial Library, in collaboration with Information Technology Services and Academic Technologies, created the AI Show & Share series to build a peer-to-peer space for practical learning. This initiative brings to light real-world use cases happening right here across all campuses, shares best practices, and demystifies how AI tools can be applied ethically and effectively in academic health sciences.
A Look Back
In our previous sessions, colleagues from across departments came together to demonstrate hands-on applications, discuss ethical considerations, and examine different AI tools. From a dive into ChatGPT, Gemini, Clara AI mobile app, Zoom AI Companion, Notebook LM, Gemini “Gems” feature, all of the AI features in ATSU Library databases like Scopus or UpToDate or Still OneSearch, Google Vids, and more. We thank our kind volunteers who took the time out of their busy schedules to either provide a pre-recorded video demonstration or a live demonstration during a session.
If you were unable to attend a live session or want to revisit a specific demo, recorded materials are available to faculty and staff through the ATSU Library AI LibGuide.
Coming Up: Fall 2026 AI Show & Share with Rachel Geoghegan, DAT, ATC
We invite all ATSU faculty and staff to join us for a new three-part Zoom series featuring Rachel Geoghegan, DAT, ATC, assistant professor, ATSU-Arizona School of Health Sciences. All sessions are conducted virtually via Zoom and dedicated time for peer Q&A.
Understand the difference between quick, one-off prompts and custom-structured frameworks that produce reliable, high-quality results every time.
Guidance on how to create tailored AI assistants aligned with your specific course materials, research topics, or department workflows.
Practical guidelines for ensuring privacy, data security, academic integrity, and ethical considerations when deploying AI in educational settings.
Look out for the AI Show & Share emails for session dates in September, October, and November, including Zoom links and follow-up resources. We hope you can join us!
She is one of seven students across the country selected for the scholarship, which aims to cultivate the next generation of dental leaders who are committed to making positive changes in oral health. The scholarship supports dental students who exemplify exceptional leadership, service, academic achievement, and professional excellence.
Saad was presented with the scholarship on Monday, July 20, 2026, by ATSU-ASDOH Dean Desmond Gallagher, BDS, MA, FACD, and Janet Woldt, PhD, MS, associate dean, associate professor.
Summer Updates & Celebrations from the ATSU Libraries
Summertime brought a robust wave of activity across our three campus libraries. From national recognitions to welcoming our newest students, our team has been hard at work supporting the ATSU community. Here is a quick look at what we’ve been up to:
Conference Highlights & National Honors In May, library staff represented ATSU at the annual Medical Library Association (MLA) conference in Milwaukee, WI, presenting two posters, three papers, and three immersion sessions.
Special congratulations to the team behind the poster, “Beyond the Desk: Using a Targeted Email Campaign to Boost Student Engagement and Success in PA Clinical Rotations,” Hal Bright, Dot Winslow, and Laura Barkema, which earned Best Research Poster for the entire conference! Kudos to everyone who contributed and participated.
Welcoming Students & Supporting Research July was all about onboarding. We welcomed incoming students to the Arizona and Missouri campuses with a series of interactive orientation activities showcasing our core library services for students.
A friendly reminder for faculty and staff: our 3D Print Lab and Poster Printing Services remain fully operational and eager to support your academic projects. If you are focused on scholarship this term, take a moment to review our latest article on New Library Research Processes.
Faculty & Staff Achievements Please join us in celebrating a few major staff accomplishments:
Hal Bright published an article examining DO exam prep collections across COM libraries in JMLA.
Student AI Literacy Course Team (Julia Peters, Leslie Golamb, Dot Winslow, and Jessica Richardson) successfully authored and launched a new Student AI Literacy course for incoming ATSU students, made possible by an internal ATSU grant. Interested in enrolling your students? Reach out to your liaison librarian.
A Fond Farewell Finally, we want to extend a heartfelt farewell to Maud Mundava, our Assistant University Library Director, Missouri Campus Library Head, and liaison to MOSDOH and CGHS. Maud, you leave big shoes to fill, and your dedication has deeply impacted so many across ATSU. We wish you all the best in your next chapter!
Need Assistance?
Have questions or need support this term? Check out our FAQ Page, reach out directly to your liaison librarian, or connect with Hal Bright via chat or at hbright@atsu.edu.
Best, Hal Bright ATSU Libraries
New Tutorials Available: Strengthen Your Research Data Management Skills
Have federal grant requirements become overwhelming or time-consuming? The Library’s Research Data Management Services is pleased to introduce two new self-paced tutorials that simplify key research administration processes and help researchers meet evolving funding requirements.
Mastering the SciENcv Biosketch guides researchers through managing their digital research identity and using the SciENcv platform to create agency-compliant biosketches with confidence. The tutorial demonstrates how to automate publication imports, generate certified biosketch documents, and simplify the preparation process for grant applications.
Mastering Research Data Management (RDM) and the NIH Data Management and Sharing Policy provides a behind-the-scenes look at developing an effective Data Management and Sharing (DMS) Plan. Researchers will gain a clear understanding of each required plan element, learn how to apply them to NIH-funded projects, receive a hands-on demonstration of the DMPTool, and explore how the 2023 NIH DMS Plan aligns with the updated 2026 requirements.
Whether you’re preparing your first grant application or looking to stay current with NIH policy changes, these tutorials offer practical guidance and resources to support your research success.
