FirstEval-Melissa Kovacs

Melissa Kovacs

Race, Data, and Justice

This month I’ve had two opportunities to speak about data work I did for the ACLU of Arizona examining racial differences in Maricopa County Attorney’s Office prosecutor data. I’m grateful the ACLU included me in their important work to better understand the criminal justice system in Arizona.  Our public report can be found here, and …

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COVID-19: Curve-Flattening, Models, and Garbage Data

We’ve been surrounded lately with an abundance of news that has forced the field of epidemiology (statistics related to diseases and applied to public health) into our thoughts. Epidemiologists are experts specifically in the prevalence and spread of diseases, like COVID-19, among populations. And, while epidemiologists are statisticians, not all statisticians are trained in epi …

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Tech Companies (and Pearl Jam) Compelled to Alleviate Homelessness Crises in their Backyards

While more of a list than a blog post, I’ve been tracking corporations’ recent efforts to reduce homelessness and thought I would share my list with you. Here are five big announcements around corporate social responsibility (“CSR”) efforts towards minimizing the current homelessness crisis in companies’ cities. Plus one from one of my favorite bands.  …

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Do I Need a Statistician or A Forensic Accountant

Expert forensic accountants and expert statisticians both look at data and offer opinions on numbers, but take very different approaches and follow different industry standards and ethics. In this article in Arizona Attorney magazine, I discuss these differences and how to know when you need a statistician or a forensic accountant as an expert.

2017’s Most Notable – Marketing Analytics, Mentoring, Ethics in AI, and More!

Because Top-Eight lists are so much more fun than Top-Ten lists, I offer my Top-Eight (plus one!) notable things that caught my attention this year.  In no particular order…   Ethics in Data and AI I am sure this has been going on prior to 2017, but 2017 seemed to be the year I started …

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