Board of Trustees Elects Two New Members

Board welcomes lawyer Grace Speights and businessman Ave Tucker

June 24, 2013

new trustees member

Two new members have joined the George Washington University Board of Trustees.  Ave Tucker, B.B.A. ’77, CEO and co-founder of TM Financial Forensics, LLC, a business and litigation consulting company, and Grace Speights, J.D. ’82, partner in Morgan Lewis’ labor and employment law practice, were elected to the board during a June 21 meeting.

“We are privileged to have two such accomplished individuals join our board,” Chairman W. Russell Ramsey, B.B.A. ’81, said. “Their unique perspectives and breadth of expertise will be an asset to the GW community.”

The new trustees will begin service July 1.

“I am looking forward to working with Grace and Ave as we continue to work on the growth of the George Washington University as a world-class research institution,” said incoming Chairman Nelson A. Carbonnell, B.S. ’85.

Mr. Tucker is the CEO and co-founder of TM Financial Forensics, LLC, a business and litigation consulting company. He is also a consulting professor at Stanford University, where he teaches two graduate-level finance and accounting courses. Mr. Tucker, a member of the dean’s board of advisors for the School of Business, is a certified public accountant, and he holds a certified in financial forensics designation given by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

Mr. Tucker’s consulting experience includes management and regulatory consulting, prior financial statement and special purpose auditing and litigation consulting and expert testimony on antitrust, breach of contract, bankruptcy, class action, securities, intellectual property, employment and labor, mergers and acquisitions, environmental, professional negligence, fraud investigations, white collar investigations, insurance, regulatory investigations, government contracts, construction, consumer products, defective products, entertainment and sports, funds tracing and other disputes.

Previously, Mr. Tucker, who came to GW on a baseball scholarship and majored in accounting, was a managing director and member of the executive committee of Navigant Consulting, an international consulting company. Prior to joining Navigant, Mr. Tucker co-founded and was the CEO of Tucker Alan, Inc.

Grace Speights, J.D. ’82, is a partner in Morgan Lewis’ labor and employment law practice; deputy national leader of the labor and employment law practice; managing partner of the Washington, D.C., office; chair of the firm’s systemic employment litigation practice group; co-chair of the firm’s diversity committee; a member of the firm’s partner compensation committee and a member of the firm’s promotions committee.

Ms. Speights’s practice focuses on counseling and defending clients in connection with employment discrimination claims, primarily involving class action litigation, and on counseling clients regarding diversity best practices.

She joined Morgan Lewis in 1984, after having clerked for the late Judge Aubrey E. Robinson, Jr., United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Ms. Speights has also served on the adjunct faculty of the Washington College of Law of the American University.

Ms. Speights serves on the District of Columbia Judicial Nominations Commission, the Advisory Committee on Local Rules for the United States District Court for the District of Columbia and is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia.

Ms. Speights received her B.A. degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1979.