When Bill Keute, DDS ’26, was growing up in northern Minnesota, he saw first-hand how difficult it can be to receive regular dental care in a rural area. “People would have to call around to offices, drive to other towns and wait months to get any dental work done,” he said. “Since I’ve been in dental school, I was able to understand the bigger picture by learning more about this issue through classes like our public health series.”
Keute is already working to make an impact. “Throughout my time in dental school, I’ve volunteered in policy and advocacy roles within our American Student Dental Association (ASDA) chapter, our national ASDA advocacy council and the Minnesota Dental Association,” he said. “I’ve learned more about structural challenges with geographic and financial barriers to care and ways to help address them. At ASDA conferences, I’ve been able to meet so many incredible people from dental schools across the country, while expanding my passion for advocacy and policy within dentistry, but beyond clinical work.”
There’s plenty to love about attending school here in the Twin Cities, and Keute enjoys all of it. First, there’s what he described as the “collaborative and supportive community of my peers.” Beyond his classmates, he also cited appreciation for the “availability of specialties and rotations to learn about different areas in dentistry.”
Keute’s love of the outdoors is yet another reason to enjoy life on campus. “The location is in the middle of the city, but there are still many outdoor spaces and accessibility to the lakes, rivers and forests,” he said. He’s a big fan of the East and West River Roads, “because they have great walking and biking paths along the upper and lower banks of the Mississippi.”
He keeps up his Paul Bunyan cred by joining a group of classmates who do log-rolling together at the RecWell. Another group in which he participates pledges to eat lunch outside every day possible (with breaks for winter weather). “The dental student culture here is welcoming and collaborative, so we’re able to work together and have fun while getting through dental school,” he said.