In Memoriam – Mel Galbraith

The Unitec whānau received the very sad news that Mel Galbraith, Senior Lecturer from the School of Environmental and Animal Sciences, had passed after a short illness. We wanted to share the thoughts and words of those who had worked closest with him. Please do share any thoughts and memories that you may have with us as well.

“Mel has been a member of the EAS team for many years, and we feel like we have lost a member of our family. Mel was a genuine kind and gentle soul, and without intending to, has been a mentor to many staff with various research and teaching guidance. He will be sorely missed.” Laura Harvey and the EAS Leadership team.

Thank you to Peter de Lange for allowing us to share this wonderful tribute to Mel that he wrote for his funeral.

“Yesterday (28 September 2023), three minutes before I boarded my flight to Rēkohu I learned that my friend, mentor and work colleague Mel Galbraith lost his battle to cancer. Only six weeks ago Mel had reported in to work (School of Environmental & Animal Sciences (EAS)) with a bad back, so we did what we always do for others in our school, we took over his lectures for him, wished him speedy recovery and got back to it (no hassle, make do). A day before I went on holiday to Australia, Mel was rushed into North Shore Hospital with more serious issues, whilst in Australia I learned he had Stage 4 cancer. We were all surprised – as no doubt Mel was, he had no obvious symptoms until that back pain. Now Mel has passed – all so quick. I had a lot to think about as I flew to Rēkohu.

I knew of Mel Galbraith when I worked for the Department of Conservation though our paths crossed little until I started as an Associate Professor at EAS in September 2017. Mel was on my interview panel and was my work mentor. I helped teach several courses he coordinated. Mel kindly gave me his lectures to work from – they were not quite what I expected. Mel liked to talk to pictures, images which held deep meaning to him but not necessarily to me. He also liked quotes, lots of quotes, and animations. I recollect I once did five hours-worth of his lectures in a one-hour lecture session. When I told him I needed the other lectures for that course he was surprised, I had them all he said. I lecture fast, Mel was more measured and sometimes his lectures defied my thinking. For example, I can now confess that I never mastered his “Duck” Lecture (gave that one up last year). Mel lectured in a slow friendly pace, it was relaxing and nurturing, so I had to improvise and change my lecturing style when working with his content. That was Mel though, through and through. A quiet, thoughtful achiever who saw no need to blow trumpets. He often lectured sitting on a table swinging his legs back and forth. He was a gentle soul who thought deeply before responding. I liked that.

Mel held an M.Sc. (Hons.) from the University of Auckland and on his passing was close to completing his PhD with the Auckland University of Technology. Mel’s speciality was ecological restoration, though he had critical skills in biosecurity, ornithology and entomology. Aside from his Senior Lecturer role at EAS, where he quietly and meticulously worked away at managing myriad courses, ākonga (students), the Bachelor of Applied Sciences (as Program Coordinator) and the EAS Research Committee. Mel was also senior editor of ‘Perspectives in Biosecurity’ the first of the journals to be created in the ePress series managed by Unitec, which is now into seven issues and 15 papers. During his time on that journal he patiently built it up and from time to time he also published there. Indeed one paper he co-authored with Associate Professor Mark Large in 2017 on the projected impact of Austropuccinia psidii has now been cited 11 times with 312 reads, and another Mel, Mark, and I mentored an undergraduate student through on bee (Apis mellifera) dispersal of Austropuccinia urediniospores published in 2021 has now been cited 8 times with a staggering 867 reads (data from Research Gate).

During his academic career of 22 years Mel published 17 papers, notably coordinating a special issue of the New Zealand Journal of Ecology on Tiritirimatangi (published in 2013). Mel also developed the databasing system that was used by the EAS Herbarium (UNITEC) between 2001 and 2022 and established a teaching collection of invertebrates for Level 5 and 7 courses. Outside the normal day to day classes Mel was very active in encouraging ākonga to participate in field work with other organisations and researchers, including annual field work on Motukaikoura and trips to Tiritirimatangi. Mel was a respected leader in local community-based restoration projects especially those involving indigenous forest remnants of Birkenhead, Tāmaki Makarau / Auckland City. Mel played key roles in Birds of New Zealand (formerly the Ornithological Society of New Zealand) and he encouraged ākonga to help on their regular beach patrols. Mel had a keen interest in ants and in his gentle way soon had students investigating the ant communities of a range of locations over the years. What I especially appreciated about Mel was his enormous empathy and understanding of the diversity of ākonga we teach. His pastoral care was always excellent. Ākonga respected him, affectionately referring to him as ‘Uncle Mel’ or ‘Grandad Mel’. Mel never judged.

In addition to his roles in the B.A.Sci. degree (he coordinated six courses), Mel had been instrumental in the development of several postgraduate papers and numerous aspects of a new postgraduate degree EAS established earlier this year. He assisted with the NZQA review of the proposed degree in February 2023, giving a good account of the research focus of the degree to a sometimes ‘difficult’ panel. In my role as Program Coordinator for the postgraduate courses I appreciated Mel’s keenness to develop course content. Mel was, as I said already the quiet achiever, excellent and trusted at taking on responsibilities and doing what was needed with minimal hassle.

Its going to be mentally hard for me to finish NSCI 6745 Ecological Evaluation and Management – his course that I taught a “little” of, and now I am doing it all. It’s going to be hard working through his slides and not being able to ask him what his intent was on some of them. I am going to miss our staff tea room chats, or ‘caving’ into his cluttered office, shovelling items off a chair and sorting out issues whilst he perched precariously on his seat with books on his lap whilst trying to write erudite prose on his keyboard jammed haphazardly on his cluttered desk.

Hell I didn’t even know his birthday – he was that private. I just knew he had turned 70, in March.

I don’t know what Mel’s beliefs were. I know his whanau was everything though. He lived for Sonya and his daughters, was proud of his grandchildren, and he always dropped what he was doing to help them out.

I am privileged to have known Mel. I just wish I had done more for him in the last few weeks – I meant to visit more often and I didn’t. That’s on me now.”

Our thoughts are with Mel’s whānau and close friends.