Mike began his work in the dental industry serving as an advisor to practitioners on the management of their practices more than a decade ago. Mike was also part of the creation of a dental purchasing group and has been involved in a number of businesses associated with dentistry and education.
Mike has a BBA in Economics from the University of Georgia, a Master of Science in Management from Troy University, and a Master of Arts in Business Administration from the University of Georgia.
Mike has served as a member of the faculty of the Terry College of Business at the University of Georgia since 2014. While Mike has taught numerous courses in Management during his time as a faculty member, he most often teaches International Strategic Management to senior level undergraduates.
Mike is also very active in his local Kiwanis Club having been in every club office. He also has served the Georgia District of Kiwanis as a Lieutenant Governor and currently serves on the Georgia Kiwanis District Foundation.
Upon graduation from the Medical College of Georgia School of Dentistry, Dr. Cooper returned home and started his private practice in Trenton, GA. He served patients from the tri-state area providing comprehensive dental care for thirty years before deciding to enter academics. This decision was based on his strong desire to share his clinical experience, his desire to champion the complete dental care of patients, and his passion for the dental profession.
He enjoyed his time at The Dental College of Georgia, making lifelong friends of faculty members and students. He served as a team leader in the comprehensive care senior clinic, while serving on various committees. He obtained the academic rank of Professor. He also maintained a very active dental practice within the school, treating patients from all walks of life.
He received various awards including, the American College of Dentists Professionalism Award multiple times and the prestigious Judson C. Hickey Award for outstanding teaching. He was one of five general dentists to serve on the American College of Prosthodontists’ Digital Dentistry Curriculum Committee. He is a member in the American Dental Association (life member), The Medical College of Georgia Alumni Association (life member), a Fellow in the Academy of General Dentistry (life member), Pierre Fauchard Academy Fellow, OKU Honor Society, and the Hinman Dental Society.
Retired Professor and Chair of the Department of General Dentistry in the Dental College of Georgia at Augusta University. Following a successful career as a private practice dentist, Dr. Callan returned to his alma mater in 2000. He has since received his Doctoral degree in Education--Curriculum Innovation from Augusta University.
While serving as a faculty member at the Dental College of Georgia, Dr. Callan was also the director of the Senior Comprehensive Care Clinic. Dr. Callan still actively conducts research on the application of digital technologies in the education of health professionals.
He is a member of the American Dental Education Association’s Commission on Change and Innovation, the International College of Dentists, the American College of Dentists, the Pierre Fauchard Academy, OKU Dental Honor Society, Augusta University Academy of Educators and the Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society.
How it all began
Promethean Dental Systems was established in late 2020 as a combination of two predecessor companies that started in early 2019, after the Simodont was researched, tested and viewed as a life-like, accurate and objective means of testing hand skills for aspiring dental students. The initial research was conducted by owners Rick Callan and Jerry Cooper, who saw more and more students arriving in their Senior Clinic at the Dental College of Georgia without hand skills and in particular, indirect vision skills. The company’s predecessor companies were initially focused on evaluating the hand skills of pre-admission students. The evaluation of hand skills proved that ~50% of students were naturals and demonstrated hand skills in 3 hours of training and assessment. It demonstrated that ~90% of students demonstrated hand skills 6 hours of training and assessment. It also demonstrated that ~10% of students struggled and required additional training and assessment to demonstrate hand skills, while ~2% did not demonstrate hand skills. The next challenge taken by the owners was to integrate the Simodont into a dental school. The team started a project with UNC Chapel Hill, focused on the installation, training and integration of the Simodont into the dental school curriculum. During this project, the team, led by Rick Callan and Jerry Cooper, demonstrated that technology would become a disrupter and driver the team would use to evolve dental education. One of the biggest areas of improvement would be machine-graded assessment or objective grading. With significant skills in the use of Digital Dentistry technology the team began to integrate the use digital technology to provide accurate, objective assessments, using products like oral scanners, comparison software and innovative procedural assessments in the Simodont. These accomplishments led the team to the realization that all assessments can be graded objectively and accurately, and that Promethean Dental Systems now had the ability to provide, both evidence of completion and evidence of performance.
Dental Education that focuses on Performance
With the ability to provide both evidence of completion and performance, the team set its sights on the next milestone, which was providing remediation services for professionals. The team’s initial customer was the State Board of Dentistry in Georgia. Achieving this milestone signaled the initial integration of the predecessor companies and the eventual formation of Promethean Dental Systems. Performing remediation services led to what is now an exclusive arrangement with the AADB to provide remediation services for the entire country through a program called Remediate +. It also led to Promethean Dental Systems’ to the realization and current focus on Patient-Less Simulation, which includes end to end case management workflows delivered in digital, virtual reality, augmented reality and physical environments without patients. With a strong understanding of how aspiring dental students might be evaluated as Applicants, the use cases for dental schools and students and the ability to provide accurate, objective assessments for professionals using remediation, Promethean Dental Systems began to approach dental education with a focus on Performance from initial interest to retirement. Promethean Dental System develops elite dental performance for Applicants, Students, Professionals and Practices. Promethean’s next step was to team with a testing agency on a licensure exam. Promethean Dental Systems provided its first simulated licensure exam in 2021, which was delivered in Georgia. This resulted in licensing the first dentist ever via a licensure exam on a Simodont in the world. It proved that students could take an exam on the Simodont without been taught on the system for the sole purpose of passing a licensure exam. The multimodal exam proved that it has patient-like dental fidelity and that examiner subjectivity can be removed in lieu of accurate and objective assessments. It proved that the licensure exam can be taken in less time and can cost less. It also proved that tests that are psychometrically accurate prove the examiners are aligned on how to grade the test. However, in 2022, while grading with examiners and objective machine grading in parallel, it proved that although psychometricaly accurate, students who were graded objectively performed many points differently than what examiners graded subjectively. Promethean Dental Systems is committed to improving upon the licensure exams provided in the Spring of 2021 by offering licensure exams that are convenient to schedule, take less time, cost less, are 100% objectively graded and that come with immediate feedback on candidate performance.
Power Users of Advanced Technology
As Promethean Dental Systems developed elite performance, the team has been developing collaborative relationships, knowledge and innovating new uses of advanced dental education technologies. Each technology used is tested to its limits by the team, documented, and assessed for it application and integration into the dental workflow. Promethean Dental Systems is collaborating with dental technology companies to learn about how they are installed and how users are trained to use the products. Promethean Dental Systems exclusively partners with multiple dental product and service providers to create the performance . Promethean Dental Systems works exclusively with best-in-class dental product and service providers. This collaboration is the toolset used by Applicants, Students, Professionals and Practices served by Promethean Dental Systems. A great example of this approach is the way in which Promethean Dental Systems collaborates with Nissin Dental and Kilgore International to design innovative, new cases for the Simodont, while exclusively providing leasing, installation, training and cloud services, like hosting, the idea box and analytic dashboards to augment the integration and insights of the product.
Conclusion
Promethean Dental Systems is excited about the progress made to date and relishes the opportunity to develop learning options that evolve dental education from the time an aspiring dentist begins to think about a dental career until the time they retire.
