Pilar del Castillo Vera. Minister for Education, Culture and Sport in the Spanish Government, 2000 to 2004. Member of the European Parliament, since 2004; coordinator for the Group of the European People's Party in the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy, and substitute member in the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs. Member of the EP Delegation for Relations with India. Law graduate at Complutense University of Madrid, 1974. In 1980 she was granted a Fulbright Scholarship for a Master's Degree in Political Science at Ohio State University, USA. PhD in Law from Complutense University of Madrid, 1983. Awarded the Spanish Sociological Research Centre Prize for the doctoral thesis 'Political Party Funding in Western Democracies', 1984. In 1986 she became Assistant Professor in Constitutional Law at UNED, and Professor in Political Science and Administration in 1994. Editor-in-Chief of the Journal 'Nueva Revista de Pol�tica, Cultura y Arte', 1995-1996. Director of the Spanish Sociological Research Centre, 1996 to 2000. She is author of numerous publications on political parties and electoral behaviour. Chair of the European Internet Foundation. 

July 31st, 1952 in Nador (Age 72) as María Pilar del Castillo Vera