In 2000, Crangle won a court case against Stanford for damages done to her when she complained of gender discrimination in Stanford’s medical school (see Fall 2000 Newsletter). The jury awarded her the maximum amount allowed by law. Stanford appealed this decision.

(Such appeals are the obvious thing for a University to do. The complainant has less financial resources and less time to go through appeal as she needs to put her professional life back together. A University has no such need, such work is their attorneys’ professional life. Also, the higher the court, the more likely the judges are to be friendly to established power. And yet appeals are necessary to our legal structure . . .)

Since the appeal was made the two parties have settled. Crangle told WAGE, “Although the terms of the settlement are confidential, nothing in the settlement prevents me from continuing to tell my story, and helping other women at Stanford and elsewhere combat discrimination. Mine was the first gender-bias case against Stanford ever to go to trial. It has established forever that you can hold a powerful institution accountable.”

A Department of Labor investigation that Crangle’s complaints helped trigger continues and should also help change the pattern of gender discrimination at Stanford’s medical school.  Further information about her case and others is at www.gender-equity.org.