Ann Arbor, MI — May 3, 2011 — The University of Michigan School of Dentistry’s dental hygiene program has bestowed its Outstanding Alumna Award to Sheree Duff, associate dean of Dental Science Programs at Baker College in Auburn Hills, Michigan.

A 1980 graduate of the School’s dental hygiene program, Duff received the award for her contributions to the dental hygiene profession.  After receiving her bachelor’s degree, Duff worked in a periodontal practice as a dental hygienist and later worked in the periodontal practice of her husband, Dr. Benson Duff, who earned his dental degree from U-M that same year.

After receiving her master’s degree in health care administration from Central Michigan University in 1991, Duff accepted an administrative position at Mott Children’s Health Center in Flint where she helped run the dental department.  Later, when Baker College of Port Huron created its dental hygiene and dental assisting programs, Duff became the program’s founder and its first director in 1995.  Ten years later, when the college announced plans to establish similar programs at the Auburn Hills campus, Duff took on that job, designed a fully accredited dental assistant program there, and was named associate dean of the dental science programs.

Duff has been active in the Michigan Dental Hygienists’ Association and its St. Clair and Oakland district chapters.  In 2002, she was awarded the St. Clair County Dental Hygiene Society’s Hygienist of the Year Award. Last summer she received the Sunstar/Registered Dental Hygienists’ Award of Distinction.  Duff is also a member of the School of Dentistry’s Alumni Society Board of Governors.  Recently, she initiated the Benson Duff Endowed Graduate Periodontics Scholarship to honor the memory of her husband who died in 2008.