University of Tennessee Health Science Center College of Dentistry: Average DAT, GPA, and How to Get In

Numbers below come from the school's own published materials as of July 2026 (each is linked to its source). Admissions stats shift every cycle — treat these as a snapshot and confirm on the school's official admissions page before you apply.

UTHSC College of Dentistry is a public DDS program in Memphis, TN. Here's exactly what UTHSC has told applicants about its own program, straight from the school's pages — including the places it doesn't publish a number, which we say plainly instead of guessing or borrowing an unsourced figure from a third-party aggregator.

UTHSC dental school stats at a glance

UTHSC doesn't publish an average DAT score — but it does publish a bar

We checked UTHSC's admissions pages, its DDS FAQ page, its financial-aid PDF, and a recent UTHSC News article, and found no official published average DAT or average GPA for an entering class. What UTHSC's admissions page does state is a competitiveness threshold rather than a class average: GPA scores are "generally competitive at 3.5 or higher" (2.75 minimum to apply), and "an applicant with a DAT Academic Average score of 400 points or better will be considered competitive" — on the new 200-600 scale, roughly an old-scale Academic Average of 20. A separate FAQ page says competitive applicants have "a total score in the 150+ range with no scores lower than 17 in any section," language that reads like the older scale and may not have been fully updated. Third-party sites float specific average-DAT and average-GPA numbers for UTHSC, but none are backed by anything UTHSC itself has published, so we're leaving those out.

To see where that published 400 Academic Average threshold actually sits nationally, our DAT score percentiles guide walks through the ADA's own percentile tables — a 400 AA lands at roughly the 54th percentile, meaning UTHSC's stated competitive bar sits right around the middle of the national test-taking pool, not near the top of it. Run your own practice scores through our DAT score converter to see exactly how they compare, on either scale.

Class size and the Healthy Smiles Initiative

Per a UTHSC News article on the state-funded Healthy Smiles Initiative ($53 million over five years), UTHSC's College of Dentistry is growing its entering DDS class from a historical base of 110 to 120 starting July 2023, targeting 130 within several years — described as "the largest [class] in approximately 30 years." The same initiative funds 29 new DDS faculty positions, a new $45 million Delta Dental of Tennessee Building, and expanded clinical rotation sites in Crossville, Knoxville, Kingsport, Jackson, and Pulaski. There's no dated, single-number "class profile" page confirming the exact 2026 headcount, so treat 110-to-130 as the most recent officially published trajectory, not a locked-in current-cycle count.

Residency is a bigger admissions lever here than at most schools: per UTHSC's admissions page, "approximately 7 percent of our class is made up of applicants from all other states," which means roughly 93% of seats go to Tennessee (and some Arkansas) residents. Out-of-state applicants are competing for a small fraction of an already limited number of seats.

Application deadline

Per the school's official DDS application page, "all application materials must be submitted, and all DAT tests taken by" September 30. The AADSAS cycle runs June 1 through September 30, interviews begin in early July, and the page notes that interview slots typically fill by early September — so UTHSC itself recommends submitting early rather than waiting for the deadline.

Tuition

UTHSC's own 2025-2026 Estimated Cost of Attendance PDF lists Tennessee-resident tuition at $32,690/year for DDS1-4. Non-resident students pay that same base tuition plus a $41,698/year out-of-state surcharge, for roughly $74,388/year in total tuition before fees, dental kits, or living costs. The PDF explicitly labels these figures as estimates and notes that tuition and fees are officially established each July, directing students to the Bursar's fee page for final numbers — confirm the current-cycle figure before budgeting.

The interview process

Per the school's DDS FAQ page, UTHSC interviews are conducted by a panel of "usually three faculty members and the Chair of the Admissions Committee," and the school explicitly frames the interview as "a two-way conversation," encouraging applicants to bring their own questions rather than treating it as a one-sided evaluation.