Leslie McClure
Chair, Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, Dornsife School of Public Health at Drexel University

Educational Background
PhD, Biostatistics, University of Michigan
MS, Preventive Medicine and Environmental Health (Biostatistics), University of Iowa
BS, Mathematics, University of Kansas

Leslie McClure grew up in suburban Kansas City (on the Kansas side), where she was a nerdy kid who found her people in the band. McClure was in marching band in high school and college, where she learned about teamwork, collaboration, and leadership. She also credits marching band with teaching her about work/life balance—she was not a music major, yet devoted much of her non-class time to music.

McClure started off as a business major, thinking she wanted to go to law school, but was bored with her classes. As she wandered through different majors in her first two years of college, she realized she kept taking math classes “just for fun,” so decided to major in math. She minored in biology, taking as many quantitative biology classes as she could find.

When McClure was getting close to graduation, she realized she wasn’t quite ready for the real world, so decided to stay in school. She didn’t know what to do with her math degree, but found biostatistics graduate programs that met her two criteria: applications did not require the math GRE subject test and degrees did not require proficiency in a language (computing or otherwise). She applied for MS programs, thinking she could explore options for the PhD if she liked what she was doing.

McClure found she loved the ability to use her quantitative skills in a way that helps others do better science, so she did go on to get her PhD. To this day, something she loves about being a biostatistician is she gets to help others do better science through her statistical expertise while furthering her own field. Her work is predominantly in clinical trials, although she has dabbled in environmental epidemiology.

Consistent with her desire to help others do better science, McClure loves the opportunity to help her colleagues become better statisticians. As department chair, this is a large part of her role—mentoring faculty and students to meet their goals. She is thankful so many have entrusted her to support them, and she sees the achievements of her mentees as among her biggest accomplishments. Similarly, she is eternally grateful to those who have helped her meet her goals. There have been, and continue to be, many.

As McClure has grown up in the field of statistics, she has developed a passion for ensuring the community is welcoming to everyone. She has dedicated considerable effort to advocating for women and under-represented minorities in the math sciences.

When not being a department chair or clinical trials statistician, McClure enjoys spending time with her family and is an avid runner. She also writes a blog, Stat Girl, and completed her first (sprint) triathlon in 2019. She is looking forward to her next one this year.