ROANOKE TIMES 

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, April 1, 1990                   TAG: 9004020198
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: F2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Short

VMI, FACULTY, COEDS: BEWARE THE STATISTICS

DID THE headline "VMI poll finds faculty favor for women" result from a lack of close reading by the headline writer? Did the reporter not understand the data he was given? Or is this an example of statistics being manipulated?

A simple majority of 120, the total faculty at VMI, is 61. Of the 80 who responded to the female admissions question, 50.4 (63 percent of 80) faculty members were for admitting females; 50.4 is 10.6 people less than a simple majority. Therefore, how can one say that the faculty favors admitting women?

Additionally, the data given for the American Association of University Professors meeting on Feb. 27 is misleading. Is 20 the total AAUP membership or do all VMI faculty members belong to AAUP? A simple majority of 20 is 11; however, 11 is less than 10 percent of 120.

I am not a statistician or even a good mathematician. I am a careful reader who learned long ago to be wary of numbers, especially percentages, and the way they are used. Unfortunately, many of your readers will take the information in the article at face value.\ PATRICIA W. EUBANK\ ROANOKE 


 by CNB