Diversity and Discrimination in Dentistry: The University of Toronto Faculty of Dentistry

This article examines the history of discrimination against women, Jews, Blacks, and Asians at the University of Toronto dental school from 1921 to 2000. The University of Toronto was the largest dental school in Canada. Discrimination could take various forms - the most obvious was a quota. As this article will show, although it was not a quota per se, the University of Toronto dental school discriminated against Jewish students in the admissions process at least until 1954 and possibly thereafter. There appears to have been no discrimination against women in the admission process, although there is evidence of discrimination against Asian applicants. In addition to discrimination around admissions, students and professors also subjected Jewish, female, and other minority students to daily acts of hostility (sometimes guised in the form of teasing) that made the atmosphere less than welcoming.