Mary received her B.A. in social work from St. Olaf College, and her MSW from the University of Washington, concentrating in health care and aging. She practiced social work in hospital, hospice, nursing home, and home care settings. Mary recently retired from a 34-year teaching career at St. Olaf College where she taught courses in social policy, social work practice, ethics, family studies, death and dying and social welfare history. She helped found an HIV clinic, completed a fellowship with the Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs, served as a visiting scholar at the University of East London in England and a Fulbright teacher in Norway. She is a member of the Northfield Hospital Bioethics Committee and served on the NASW-MN Ethics Committee. Her article – written with three students - “Advance care planning conversations and college students” was published in MetroDoctors, The Journal of the Twin Cities Medical Society in 2020. In 2016 she founded a local group focused on advance care planning and MAID education and advocacy.