The Department of Mathematics and Statistics is pleased to announce a special presentation in our colloquium series.
 

	Speaker:	Professor Mary Gray
	Topic:	STATISTICS AND THE LAW Is statistics a sorcerer that clouds the minds of judges and juries?  Or is it a tool to help decide what the facts are?
	Date:	Tuesday, April 29, 2003
	Time:	3:35 PM
	Location:	Ward Building Room 3

 

Description:

We think of forensics as the science of cutting up a body to reveal important evidence; forensic statistics cuts through a mass of data to illuminate important issues in a legal context. This talk will show how some elementary statistical tools have helped-or failed to help-judges and juries come to their decisions in cases as disparate as discrimination and the death penalty and pensions and pipe lines.
 
 

About Mary Gray:

Professor Gray is the author of books and papers in the fields of mathematics, mathematics education, computer science, applied statistics, economic equity, discrimination law, academic freedom, and opera. She has lectured throughout the United States, Europe, the Middle East and Latin America. The first president of the Association of Women in Mathematics and past president of the Women's Equity Action League, Dr. Gray has been a member of boards and committees of such organizations as Amnesty International, the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Middle East Education Foundation, and the American Association of University Professors, has served as vice-president of the American Mathematical Society, and is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Professor Gray has been chair of the Board of Directors of Amnesty International USA and International Treasurer of Amnesty International. Professor Gray has undertaken missions to Rwanda and Iraqi Kurdistan to apply statistics to human rights and civil rights issues and has testified in numerous court cases and before Congress in the United States.

Dr. Gray has previously taught at the University of Kansas, the University of California, Berkeley, and California State University, Hayward, and has worked at the National Bureau of Standards and as a consultant for a number of government agencies and private firms. She has served several terms as chair of her department and as Director of the Women's Studies Program at American University. Her undergraduate degree is from Hastings College, her Ph.D. is from the University of Kansas, and she has studied in Germany on a Fulbright grant. She also has a J.D. degree from Washington College of Law, American University and is a member of the District of Columbia and U.S. Supreme Court bars. She has been awarded honorary degrees by the University of Nebraska and Hastings College.