Tribute to Marijcke Vlieg by Dr Dean Halford - read at her funeral on 2/10/2009 and posted here with his permission.
"It's an honour to pay tribute to a great friend and colleague.
Marijcke graduated from the Philips-Duphar School for Analysts in The Netherlands in 1963 with a Diploma specialising in physiology and pharmacology. In 1966 Marijcke came to New Zealand. Marijcke took up a technician's job in the Department of Physiology and Anatomy and later in the Dairy Husbandry Department at Massey University. She did a lot of work for Professor Don Titchen, whom she described as a hard man but whose very high standards she admired. They were a good match because Marijcke's own standards were of the same high calibre.
In 1974 Marijcke got a position in the Medical Research Laboratory at the Palmerston North Hospital as a research assistant. Her work in medical statistics there was the driver for her gaining a formal qualification in statistics and after nearly ten years at the hospital, she became a student in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics at Massey. Having taken majors in both statistics and mathematics, Marijcke graduated with a BSc (Hons) degree in 1988. She then went on to gain a PhD in Mathematics under my supervision, graduating in 1993. She was an exemplary student, coming to our regular meetings having done all the detailed work meticulously and eager to lead the discussion on what to do next. Her thesis was more like a book, so comprehensively did she cover the topic. To achieve these high-level goals at that stage of her life, Marijcke was surely an inspiration to older students.
Part of Marijcke's research concerned the behaviour of solitons. A soliton is a solitary wave that retains its form when another wave passes through it. Marijcke was, figuratively, a soliton - whatever wave she encountered, she emerged from it intact and in great shape.
For 14 months, in 1993 and 1994, Marijcke was a Postdoctoral Fellow and Contract Lecturer at Lincoln University, working with Dr Bruce Robson in the Centre for Computing and Biometrics. She greatly enjoyed this experience.
Marijcke returned to Massey University in July 1994 as a temporary Mathematics Lecturer until 1997 when she took up a job as Lecturer in Statistics at the International Pacific College for three months.
Following that, Marijcke was employed by Massey University as a Senior Tutor and Lecturer in Mathematics until her untimely death.
Teaching was Marijcke's forte. She was the best of teachers. She prepared thoroughly and knew instinctively how to pace her delivery and present material so students understood. She had high expectations of students and they got a hot remark or two if they didn't put in the effort to learn! Nontheless, Marijcke always made time to spend with students on a one-to-one basis. This was expecially true during extramural contact courses which she loved. In 1993 she received the Massey Extramural Student's Society Award of Merit for Outstanding Commitment to Extramural Teaching. For her excellence in teaching, Marijcke won an Institute of Fundamental Sciences Distinguished Teaching Award in 2001 and again in 2007, accolades she truly deserved.
Versatility was Marijcke's hallmark. She was as capable of teaching statistics as much as mathematics. But she enjoyed mathematics more and over the years taught many courses in that subject. When computer technology became part of the fabric of academic life, Marijcke quickly learned how to utilise its power in teaching, research and administration.
Research took second place to teaching in Marijcke's mathematical career. She could certainly apply herself to research - after all, she did a PhD, wrote papers independently, collaborated with others and supervised student research. However, Marijcke's belief was that teaching was of primary importance to a university - research built upon that. She felt strongly that teaching was not as well rewarded when it came to promotions or the allocations of funds.
Marijcke worked very hard for the Institute of Fundamental Sciences. She was a no-nonsense person who cut to the chase and made her viewpoint feelingly in meetings. Political correctness and Marijcke did not sit together!
Marijcke was a member of the NZ Mathematical Society and played a significant role as Massey PN correspondent to the Society's Newsletter.
Wherever Marijcke went she made friends. She attended many mathematics conferences, indeed, co-organised several, contributed papers, and enjoyed the collegiality of these occasions. No matter, whether they were the most senior Professor or the beginning student or one of the general staff, there are people in Australia, The Netherlands, the UK, America, as well as many in New Zealand whom Marijcke befriended.
She will be sorely missed by her friends and especially by her friends and colleagues at the University.
Marijcke's legacy to us is the fine example she set - determination to follow one's convictions, diligence and stamina to get the job done, ability to cope under stress, care to the individual, courtesy to others, able to joke about one-self, generous of spirit, time and effort. She was the "Mother of Massey Mathematicians".
Marijcke, for all that and much more, we salute you.
Farewell, my friend."
Tribute to Marijcke from Kee Teo and colleagues read at her funeral on 2 October 2009. Posted here with Kee's permission.
Pieter, Ingrid, Philip and friends, colleagues and students.
Marijcke was a very special person in our lives. What I am about to tell you how great Marijcke was as a teacher, colleague and friend are based on the thoughts and reflections of my colleagues, myself and many emails, phone calls I’ve received. It would be too much to read them all out, and that would not have met Marijcke’s approval. Words are insufficient to describe all Marijcke’s attributes. I will mention just a few.
First, Generosity, Eager to help
Marijcke was always willing to take up extra duties such as
• marking other lecturers’ test papers,
• Singlehandedly looking after the running of the conjoint program with PNBHS & NPBHS,
• getting material ready for all streams of Calculus,
• willingly & cheerfully getting the course organization ready when colleagues had to be away,
• supervising 8 o’clock tests so colleagues did not have to leave home early,
• meeting and looking after visitors,
• looking after colleagues houses when they were away.
The list goes on. Everyone knew if you needed help with anything just ask Marijcke, she was 100% dependable.
Next, her Concern for others well being
Marijcke always asked others to take leave except herself. She was known to often come to work when she was officially on leave.
She kept colleagues on overseas leave up to date with news and gossip.
I must now mention Marijcke’s Warm personality
• Marijcke always made new colleagues, students and visitors feel very welcome. Her office door was always open when she was in her office.
• She always made a point to go to the main office to greet the supporting staff after lunch. They will miss her cheerful greeting.
• She would talk to Michael, the Head of Spotlight about nuts and foods.
• She always invited retired colleagues to join our lunch outings.
• Chris, my next door neighbour at work, always knew when it was time for morning tea and lunch as Marijcke would turn up at my office cheerily calling out “Kee! Time for lunch”. Chris wondered who is going to do that now.
And who is going to organize those frequent lunch outings now?
Who is to organize a game of bridge at lunch time?
Marijcke was Loyal to her family, friends, colleagues, students and Massey.
Marijcke’s Sense of humour always made me crack up.
Marijcke was always Interested in colleagues non-work related activities.
It must have been really boring to listen to my constant references to Square dancing and lately hexagon dancing. “It is not my cup of tea” she would say.
And much more
However, Marijcke could not stand wastefulness, whether it was lighting, weekly free chocolate biscuits, unnecessary photo copying.
She always spoke her mind and made it known where you stood.
If she thought someone was really trying to learn, she would give them all the help she could. But watch out if you were not perceived to be trying!
Everyone knows that Marijcke was a great teacher, winning several teaching awards. Her support for students was second to none. Few know that Marijcke was eager for research. Bruce who can’t be here had worked with Marijcke for many years, said that he was always impressed with Marijcke’s courage to tackle enormous equations and patiently work through the details. She was tenacious once her “blood was up” on a problem. Just last week she was excited to tell me that she had spotted some nice patterns in her MAPLE outputs. It was these keen perceptions that Bruce was particularly impressed of. Together with Igor, Marijcke organised The Wellington Manawatu Applied Maths Day every second year.
Marijcke was always nervous about new technology, whether it is computer software, cell phone, digital camera. She always said these were for the young ones, but she learnt to master them. She used the MAPLE program to carry out her research. MATLAB was not her favourite program but she wrote an excellent workbook for staff and students to study Differential Equations, together with Bob Richardson, Marijcke set up online testing for our first year Calculus, which brought Extramural teaching a bit closer to the internal one. Who would have thought that Marijcke would be the person to do that?
Marijcke paid particular attention to details, particularly style of layout for her study material, how to write emails in a correct way. She religiously followed her rule of bridge that the first hand be dealt with a blue pack of cards starting from her and the next hand a red pack. Marijcke did not believe in probability!
Marijcke was my right hand person during my almost five years as Head of Mathematics, helping me work out Graduate and Casual Assistants duties, organizing markers, working out teaching duties, drawing up Summer School roster, organising contact courses. I thank you Marijcke.
I end by quoting the words of my colleague Bruce
“We all feel an acute personal loss, but there is also the loss of what she might have done”.
Rest in Peace now Marijcke.
Thank you for all you had done for us. We will miss you.