Background: The World Health Organization, 1995, defined medical schools’ Social Accountability (SA) as “the obligation to direct their education, research, and service activities towards addressing the priority health concerns of the community, region, and/or nation they have a mandate to serve”. The concept of social accountability is based on four basic health system principles: Relevance, Quality, Cost-effectiveness, and Equity. The challenge of measuring social accountability is a global issue, particularly for medical schools.
Objective: The purpose of the current study is to use the social accountability students’ toolkit, to recognize the availability of social accountability indicators and the awareness of the MIU dental students regarding these indicators to identify problems and areas of improvement.
Methodology: Data were collected via a paper-based questionnaire adapted from IFMSA Social Accountability Toolkit Questionnaire. Students from all educational years were invited to participate. Participation was voluntary. The questionnaire was distributed to all students and interns during the study period, with a total of 1805 dental students and interns.
Results: Findings of the study indicated that the faculty is doing well according to scoring criteria where scores from 18-26 indicate that the school is doing well. Academic year was the only statistically significant predictor of social accountability (Regression coefficient = 1.329, P-value <0.001). These results indicate a direct correlation between academic year and social accountability scores.
Conclusion: Students seemed confident in their faculty’s impact on the community.

Objectives: 1. To use the social accountability students’ toolkit.
2. To recognize the availability of social accountability indicators.
3. To assess awareness of the MIU dental students regarding these indicators to identify problems and areas of improvement.

Methodology: Data were collected via a paper-based questionnaire adapted from IFMSA Social Accountability Toolkit Questionnaire. The questionnaire consisted of 12 questions on a Likert-scale ranging from 0 to 3, where 0 means No indicating the absence of the item in question, 1means somewhat, 2 means good and 3 means excellent. A fourth choice of do not know was added to indicate that the student does not know if this item is fulfilled or not. Students from all educational years were invited to participate. Participation was voluntary. The questionnaire was distributed to all students and interns during the study period, with a total of 1805 dental students and interns. Nine hundred and seventy-five responses were collected, giving a response rate of 54%.

Results: The mean and (standard deviation) values for the total score were 19.2 (6.9), with a minimum of 0 and a maximum of 36, indicating that the faculty is doing well according to scoring criteria of the toolkit where scores from 18-26 indicate that the school is doing well, look for areas of weakness and ways to advocate to improve social accountability. Results of regression analysis for predictors of social accountability showed that academic year was the only statistically significant predictor of social accountability (Regression coefficient = 1.329, P-value <0.001). These results indicate a direct correlation between academic year and social accountability scores.

Conclusions: Students seemed confident in their faculty’s impact on the community and the integration of social accountability values.