SAN FRANCISCO – The UC Board of Regents approved a tuition increase for UCLA’s dentistry program at its Wednesday meeting.

The academic and student affairs committee approved the tuition increase for the dentistry program – as well as for a nursing program at UC Irvine and pharmacy programs at UCI and UC San Francisco – at its bimonthly meeting, held Tuesday and Wednesday at UCSF. The increases would raise the programs’ professional degree supplemental tuition, which students must pay in addition to tuition and the student services fee.

The dentistry program increases are intended to support instruction and program quality and will increase by 5% annually from the 2026-27 to the 2030-31 academic year, according to the plan’s executive summary. The 2025-26 PDST fees for the dentistry program are $35,067 and will reach $44,751 by the 2030-31 academic year, according to the summary.

The PDST fees would go toward faculty and staff salaries, as well as hiring an additional student services employee, Paul Krebsbach, the dean of the School of Dentistry, said during the meeting.

“These investments are fundamental to maintaining accreditation standards, educational quality and student success,” he said.

Regent Greg Sarris said there has been a decrease in Pell Grant recipient enrollment at UCLA’s dentistry school. He added that he believes the decreased enrollment of students who demonstrate significant financial need could indicate that students do not feel supported enough.

“A drop in the Pell Grant could be indicative of students feeling lack of access or support,” he said.

However, Krebsbach said admissions are blind to if students received Pell Grants as undergraduates and that enrollment rates fluctuate annually. He added that the dentistry school hopes to add a checkbox to its application for applicants to indicate if they are first-generation or low-income students, so that it can better support people coming from under-resourced backgrounds.

Krebsbach said during the meeting that the dentistry school’s community-focused programs – in which students work in underserved communities across California – make it stand out. UCLA’s dentistry program is one of only two public dentistry schools in the state, he added during the meeting.

“This reflects our school’s alignment with UC’s public mission to advance health, expand access to care and prepare students who are equipped to see a full spectrum of patients and population that we have in California today,” he said.

The board approved tuition increases to two UCLA graduate professional degree programs – the master of fine arts in design media arts and master of music programs – in January.

[Related: UC Board of Regents approves plan to raise tuition for 2 UCLA graduate programs]

“PDST would support critical investment in our faculty improvement and retention, technology upgrades and needs-based support to name the high quality that we expect to be of UCLA,” Krebsbach said.