MADISON — Due to not having consistent access to dental care while growing up, Monroe’s Kennedy Klemm decided to pursue a degree in dental hygiene so she could help people in similar situations to what she went through.

“I didn’t have access to dental care growing up, and I started working at a nonprofit dental clinic in 2025. I learned firsthand just how important it is for everyone to have access to dental care. I wanted to be a part of a team that helped other people with something that I didn’t have access to. I knew I wanted to do that long-term for my future,” she said.

She used to work at Fowler Dental Clinic in Monroe, but has now moved to a new practice, though she still enjoys helping people however she can.

“I work at a different practice now, but I really liked working there. We served people who didn’t have insurance or used state insurance, so a lot of those people didn’t have access to dental care either. It was really nice being someone who could understand exactly what they were going through, and how they might’ve felt,” she said.

While she was preparing for school at Blackhawk Technical College this year, the now-22-year-old learned that her four wisdom teeth would need to be removed. Since she is living on her own and saving money for school, the cost of the surgery was expected to be too high for her budget. This is when Madison Oral Surgery & Dental Implants stepped in to help. Through their Wisdom For Wisdom program, Klemm received free wisdom teeth removal as well as a $1,000 scholarship. This helped remove another obstacle for her before her classes began.

The opportunity she received through the Wisdom For Wisdom program was incredible to her and something she values greatly.

“I have cried about it, like four times. Even just thinking about it kind of makes me cry. I knew I needed them out and, obviously with school and living by myself, it was kind of hard to afford that. I didn’t have dental insurance, so I would have to pay for the extractions out of pocket, and it is pretty expensive. So being able to have that opportunity at no cost was huge to me,” Klemm said.

The Wisdom for Wisdom program “took a huge weight off” her shoulders, she said.

“Even with the $1,000 for school, another huge weight off my shoulders. That went toward my prerequisites for Spring, so that was a big help. I can’t even describe how much less stress I feel, especially after getting my teeth out. Now I’m back to eating normally, and I can move my face and everything. I just feel so much less stress because I know that’s done with, and I had that opportunity. It just helped me out so much.”

Once she’s finished with college, she plans to still spend her time helping others in situations like she was, working at a nonprofit or even going to schools to help kids whose families don’t have dental insurance.

“I have two ideas. At least in the town I’m in, I’m not sure if it’s a thing everywhere, but there are hygienists that go to schools to help kids who also don’t have dental insurance or their parents can’t afford to go to the dentist. I think I would want to be doing that part-time, just to help kids who also are in the same position I was in. Or I’d go back to working as a hygienist at a nonprofit,” she said.

Dr. Christopher Streff of Madison Oral Surgery and Dental Implants feels that she’ll do wonderful in her future endeavors with dentistry, especially because she’s had similar experiences to many of those she hopes to work with.

“Kennedy has seen both sides of the equation where she’s helped a lot of people, she’s seen a lot of people come in with dental pain and treated them,” said Dr. Streff, himself a Monroe native. “And she’s also had some of her own personal experience with having dental pain, issues with her wisdom teeth, and then trying to get the access and the care, and that’s really one of the things that’s spoke to us too with Kennedy. She’s got a great mind for dentistry, so I’m excited that she’s headed in that direction too.”

Wisdom For Wisdom is the program that Madison oral surgeons are doing to help educate and assist those that don’t have access to consistent dental care.

“The Wisdom For Wisdom program is essentially a way that we try to help the community. We always try to think of a way we can be helpful and give back, so we’ve started to do some of these campaigns,” Dr. Streff said. “This one was to help with both the education side of things and helping to get somebody out of discomfort and take care of a problem that they may not otherwise be able to afford or have access to care for. It’s kind of a way that we get to touch on both stones of giving back.

“I think one of our big philosophies is education, so when a patient comes in to see us, we want to be an educator first and try to help people understand what’s going on, what their options are, help them make an educated decision, and then obviously help them get out of any sort of discomfort. With this, it’s a way that we can give back not only on the surgery side, but also by giving a scholarship for education, which we feel is something that’s important. We kind of lucked out with Kennedy, because she wants to head in the direction of dentistry and dental hygiene, so it helps future patients as well.”

The clinic received many applicants for the Wisdom For Wisdom program, and Klemm was chosen because her story had such an impact on them that they wanted to do what they could to help her.

“We put out advertisements and worked with several dentist offices. It’s the second campaign we’ve done. The first one we did was more like a full-mouth rehabilitation for someone. A lot of offices knew we were trying to do these campaigns to give back, so when this came up, we had a lot of applicants,” Dr. Streff said. “We’re located in Madison, but I’m originally from Monroe, and we still see a lot of people from Monroe, and so we kind of went out to the Madison area and southern Wisconsin. I went through all of the applicants and got it narrowed down to a few that we wanted to interview. After interviewing Kennedy, we certainly loved her story and wanted to help her out.”

Klemm’s story helped to remind them exactly why they were doing what they do, really exemplifying the program itself.

“It warms my heart on a lot of levels. Just hearing her story of how she didn’t have access to dental care, how she worked hard and found herself falling in love with dentistry and being able to help people, it reminded me too that it’s kind of the reason all of us got into medicine,” Dr. Streff said. “Seeing her find her journey brings back memories of this being why we’re really here and trying to help people. With being able to provide a scholarship too that helped her, and seeing her reaction to it, it certainly makes us want to do more.”

One thing Dr. Streff really wants to stress is the importance of being educated about one’s wisdom teeth and the difficulties they can cause.

“They’re one of those things that are a little bit silent and a little bit more problematic, and that’s kind of the tough thing. For a lot of people, they don’t cause problems until a little bit later in life, and that’s when things are a bit more complicated,” Dr. Streff said. “That’s why we try to get it done on kids who are 16- to 20-years-old, because that is a time frame before they cause issues like deep pockets that trap bacteria or damage another tooth; they cause a lot of issues, but once they start actually being problematic is when it’s a little bit more complex to take them out where you might have issues with nerve injuries or they’ve already damaged another tooth and now it’s a two-tooth problem.

“We try to educate our local dentists and the community that if you can get them out earlier, you can avoid a lot of the potential problems that aren’t just related to wisdom teeth, but increased bacteria in your mouth and that sort of thing,” he added.