President of the International Federation of Dental Hygienists.

Robyn Watson is a Dental Hygienist who was educated in the USA and practised and taught in the USA for many years before returning to New Zealand in 1994 to participate in the introduction of the first school of Dental Hygiene in New Zealand. She has been on the Faculty of the Otago School of Dentistry, the Otago Polytechnic and consulted with the development of the BSc in Oral Health at the Auckland University of Technology where she was a Senior Lecturer. Robyn is has been affiliated with the Department of Periodontics as a lecturer at the University of Sydney and is the International liaison and Elective co-ordinator for the Dental Faculty.

She has served as Vice President and President of the NZDHA and sat on the New Zealand Dental Council for 6 years. Currently, she is the President of the International Federation of Dental Hygienists (http://www.ifdh.org/http://www.ifdh.org) where she also served as President-Elect for three years and chaired the Education and Research Committee for 6 years.  She served on the House of Delegates of IFDH for 12 years representing New Zealand.

Robyn received her Dental Hygiene education at the University of Pennsylvania, her Bachelor's degree in Dental Auxiliary Education at the University of North Carolina and her Masters in Public Administration in Health Services Management from Golden Gate University in San Francisco.

She is also a graduate of the Global Child Dental Fund (http://www.gcdfund.org) Senior Dental Leaders programme (SDL-7) at Harvard University in 2013, and the SDL-10 at Kings College, London March 2016. She has also been appointed to the Expert Panel of the “Alliance for a Cavity-Free Future” (http://www.allianceforacavityfreefuture.org)

Robyn has delivered programmes internationally for several years during which she has conducted seminars for Universities and professional groups in many countries.