Marnie Oakley’s path to becoming dean of the University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine began in the small town of Mountain Top, in northeastern Pennsylvania. As she split wood to help heat the family home, she learned the value of hard work, perseverance and the power of connection from her father, a Sears accountant, and her stay-at-home mother. She loved arts like sketching and painting as much as she loved science. Dentistry, she realized later, was a perfect bala
