Jan Pimlott, Professor Emeritus in the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry, has been selected as the 2013 Bulyea Cup Award recipient. Over the span of forty years, Professor Pimlott's career in dental hygiene has been active in teaching, in research and in practice throughout three provinces in Canada.
Dentistry's founding Dean, Dr. Bulyea was presented with a cup by Harvard University in honor of being its oldest surviving 1972 graduate of the dentistry program; he was 100 years old at the time. Many years later Mrs. Jean Portous, the surviving daughter of Dr. Bulyea, presented our dental school with that cup; Jean was 99 years of age.
The Bulyea Cup was placed in a specially built stand and since 1999 it has been awarded ten times to men and women who have distinguished themselves by extraordinary service to the School of Dentistry and the University.
Professor Pimlott was a faculty member in the School of Dentistry from 1985 to 2010, and she was the director of the dental hygiene program from 1990 to 2002. Under her leadership, she instituted the preprofessional year of study. In the year 2000 after over ten years of dedicated effort, she was the founding director of the first four-year baccalaureate dental hygiene program in Canada. Professor Pimlott was also instrumental in obtaining approval for, and lobbying change in, practice regulation for the local anesthetic course that permitted dental hygienists in Alberta to administer local anesthetic.
In addition to her work within the School of Dentistry, Professor Pimlott also held the role of director of interprofessional education (2002-2005), and in this capacity she implemented many interdisciplinary educational initiatives for ten University of Alberta health sciences programs, as well as establishing collaborative partnerships between health science faculties, health authorities and government.
Professor Pimlott received the lifetime membership to the College of Registered Dental Hygienists of Alberta, the 2004 Award of Excellence awarded by the Dental Hygiene Educators of Canada. Additionally, in recognition for her contribution to dental hygiene education at the University of Alberta, Professor Pimlott has a University of Alberta award established in her name.