What is Basic Dental Principles?
Basic Dental Principles (BDP) is a program created at UCLA School of Dentistry to provide pre-dental students the opportunity to gain more knowledge into the field of dentistry.
The program consists of a lecture series and a lab series. The lab series can only be taken once the lecture series has been completed. The two series must be taken in two separate years.
The lecture series consists of 24 sessions split throughout 2 academic quarters (Winter and Spring). The lecture topics range from getting into dental school to the different specialities within dentistry.
The lab series consists of 4 hands-on sessions on UCLA campus during either Winter or Spring quarter.
This course is IN PERSON ONLY. There is no online option.
Course Credit:
UCLA students enrolled in the lab class may be awarded up to FOUR (4) units of independent study credits (SRP 199 Credit) upon successful completion of all course work and submission of appropriate paperwork.
Registration for the 2024-2025 school year is now CLOSED. Please join our mailing list to be notified when the next round of registration opens!
Meet Our Directors
Natalie Chow
Course Director / Lecturer
Eirene Ding
Course Director / Lecturer
Francis Nguyen
Lab Coordinator / Lecturer
Fuyuto Shigihara
Lab Coordinator / Lecturer
Meet Our Lecturers

Justin Choi

Catherine Johnson

Erika Kim

Sarah Lo

Brice McKeown

Jessica Mele

Caitlin Mispagel

Tahra Nakhai

Celeste Nguyen

Nikki Parikh

Lucas Peng

Alex Tran

Jacqueline Tran

Photos by Ryan Cheung