Farewell Mirjam de Baar: ‘Your interest was always genuine’
For nine years, Mirjam de Baar was vice-dean at the Faculty of Humanities. On Monday 17 March, she took her leave in the Academy Building. ‘You have worn out two deans, two vice-deans, four business managers and six assessors.’
At the very moment De Baar was saying goodbye, several members of the Faculty Board had been felled by the flu, which was also sweeping through the rest of the faculty. However, this was not apparent from the attendance. The line of invited guests who wanted to shake De Baar's hand filled the entire hall.
Empathetic
De Baar is known throughout the university for her empathetic approach to staff and students. Rector Hester Bijl praised her ability to empathise with different perspectives and people, which was reflected in De Baar's commitment to improving the policy on teaching and minors, as well as in crisis teams such as during the corona period and the Israel-Gaza Taskforce.
‘Remembering their walks’
Dean Mark Rutgers, who himself said farewell a week earlier, joked that De Baar had deliberately stayed on a little longer than him so that she could say she had worn out two deans, two vice-deans, four operations managers and six assessors. Besides all that De Baar had done for the faculty, he said, he particularly remembered the walks they had taken together on their peer review days.
‘A first-class manager’
Former assessor Olivier Fajgenblat recalled how De Baar could correct him without criticising him when he ‘didn’t quite manage to get through a file’ in the first months of his assessorship. 'On behalf of the thousands of master’s students who took your courses over the past year, Miriam: thank you very much. You are not somebody who draws attention to yourself or praises yourself, so they are happy to do it for you. You have been a first-class manager and your efforts will not be forgotten.'
Shifting interests
After the three speeches by her fellow directors, De Baar herself looked back on her time at the faculty where she ‘felt completely at home’, but where she also found a somewhat neglected teaching domain with no fewer than 88 priorities. Among other things, she was proud of the creation of several new masters’, which took shape despite corona. ‘Of course we want to retain the expertise we have as much as possible, but if students’ interests shift, you have to respond to that.'