"If someone comes to you in pain, you don't look at your watch and say it's time to go home," said Ron Maitland (LA '60, DS '64). "Your duty is to the public, to care for other people before you have any concern for yourself."
Such is the guiding conviction of Maitland, who now serves on the Tufts Dental School's Board of Overseers, and who has been a volunteer firefighter in his town of Chappaqua, N.Y. for over 25 years.
After two years of active duty in the U.S. Navy, Maitland has spent the majority of his career in private dental practice in New York City. While maintaining his practice there, he also spends time volunteering to identify the remains of the victims of the Sept. 11 attacks - and earned the New York Academy of Dentistry's Humanitarian Award.
The award citation thanked Maitland for the "generous gifts of time, skills and knowledge that [he has] dedicated to the critical task of identifying victims of the Sept. 11th tragedy at the World Trade Center," and told him that he "helped innumerable families and friends of the victims as well as the larger community of our small planet to find peace and closure."
Maitland soon helped even more families, volunteering to assist in identifying the remains of the victims of in the crash of American Airlines Flight 587. As a result, he was named Citizen of the Year by the American Association of Dental Examiners in 2001.
But Maitland's interest in forensic science did not begin with these recent events. Rather, forensic science has been a passion of Maitland's since the beginning of his career. During his period of military service, he underwent military training in the subject. As a student at Tufts' Dental School, he took several courses in forensic dentistry, and he wrote a paper on the identification of human remains during his final year of dental school.
After the Sept. 11 attacks, doctors with Maitland's brand of expertise were in high demand, and Maitland felt compelled to volunteer. He spent the next year committed to working 12-hour shifts twice a week. But he is modest about his contributions: "I was one of many to volunteer," he said.
During this time, the crash of Flight 587 in Harbor, N.Y. created an even higher need for such experts. "It was not a major part of my career, but really, as such a personal and emotional tragedy to so many, I felt that I had to help in this difficult task," Maitland said. "You do what you have to do."
Maitland's primary focus, however, is still dentistry. Throughout his professional career, he has been an active member of the Tufts Alumni Association and has worked closely with the Tufts Dental School, teaching classes in order to prepare students for their dental licensing board exams.
"It's a fabulous school," said Maitland of the dental school. "It's very well-run - I'm happy to serve there."
Maitland has also been able to assist the Dean of the Dental School with judgments and suggestions to "further the educational mission of the school from a different perspective than those persons involved on a daily basis, such as the faculty," he said.
Maitland has also spent numerous sessions over the last few years mentoring a number of undergraduate students interested in dentistry - seven or eight of whom he "personally encouraged to go to the dental school."
In order to reward Maitland for his services to the Tufts community - and his community service and generosity in general - Maitland is one of six individuals to receive the 2005 Distinguished Service Award given by the Tufts University Alumni Association (TUAA).
The award - the highest given by the TUAA - is described on the TUAA Web site as a recognition of "the outstanding accomplishments of Tufts graduates and other members of the Tufts community in their profession, for the community, or in service to Tufts." This spring, a gala dinner will be held in honor of Maitland and his fellow award recipients.
Receiving such awards, however, is not Maitland's motivation for doing what he does. He gives, he said, in order to show his appreciation for "the education [he] received."
"I am the person who I am because of the unique education I received at Tufts, which taught me to express myself and communicate, and really to be an active part of a community," Maitland said.
