It's a long time since Andy, and I got our heads together and formed The Campbell Academy while we were still in the bungalow in West Bridgford in Nottingham.
At that stage, we developed a vision of what we would like the Academy to be, what it would feel like, what it would do and who it was for.
We were clear, though, that there was a pathway related to getting people into implant dentistry for our implant dentistry courses that would take them on a journey through straightforward, advanced and complex.
"You have to learn to stand before you can walk before you can run".
The other thing that we were clear about was that implant dentistry is a practical craft and not an academic subject in its own right.
You can learn as much as you want from books, but you have to practise, and if you don't practise, you will never be good at it.
We also understood that the days of the 'weekend warrior' courses, where you did two days and learned how to do implant dentistry and just got on with it, were long gone and in fact, it was impossible to teach someone to be an advanced expert in implant dentistry even in a year.
We looked at the courses that already existed, mainly the master's, and wondered whether teaching someone how to be a great researcher would help them when they were in general practice placing implants, and we thought not so much.
And so, we dreamt of a pathway that would take people from the start to become educators in the clinic and Academy.
We dreamt of a place where people would be colleagues at the end, where they could talk to us about complexity and difficulty and share ideas and thoughts about treating patients, and we set out to do that.
In the first instance, we started with a Year Implant Course (Year One). This was to take people through straightforward implant dentistry education from the theory and the practical aspects on a tabletop to placing implants in our place and their place and to be mentored afterwards.
This would give people a brilliant grounding, and we tried to shake off the figure where only 7% of people were placing implants two years after they attended a sponsored surgical course by the industry companies.
This was a figure that was bandied about regularly by all the companies.
Ultimately, we set that course up, and it has been hugely successful for the guys who have attended almost entirely.
We now count almost 90% of people placing implants two years after our year one course, which has just turned the numbers on its head.
The next thing we did was the Year Two Implant Course, where we had a menu for people to step forward from straightforward to advanced implant dentistry, and after that, we wanted a Year Three Implant Course.
Something like a fellowship, where people could come and share difficulties and problems and challenges and learn at the highest possible level.
This series of little blogs for the next few days provide an insight into what each course offers to see if you are interested in any implant dentistry education and where you might fit.
The nature of these courses is designed so that they can be taken over five years (it's three years of education). Still, there is a bulk discount for people who do it over the five years, so you can do Year One, stop, consolidate, do something else, then move on to Year Two and do Year Three straight after, or any combination of those you like within the five years.
You may want to stop and have a baby if you're a lady. You might want to stop and look after your baby if you're a man and let your wife go back to work.
It might be that you want to have a break from education, or financially it's difficult to do it back-to-back.
There are all sorts of reasons why you might pick and choose.
I hope this is helpful.
It's been an enormously wonderful journey for us, and the next stage starts at the beginning of 2024 with our first-ever year three course.
Blog Post Number - 3460
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