Gaalen
Erickson

Dear Lynda,

Although we have never met, I wanted to write to tell you how deeply saddened I was to hear the news about Gaalen. I came to UBC in 2010, the same year Gaalen retired, so our time in the department was not expected to overlap. Yet Gaalen went out of his way to welcome and mentor me. He visited my classes, generously shared his materials and ideas, and made me feel that I belonged. As a fellow professor, you will understand how much it meant to a new colleague that someone of Gaalen’s stature took such a genuine interest in her work. His kindness, positive attitude, humour, and confidence in me made a lasting difference.

I still keep Gaalen’s book on the history of science in my office and continue to use it in my work. It is a treasured reminder of him and of everything I learned from him. Gaalen’s influence extended far beyond UBC. When I travel and mention my department, people often ask whether it is Gaalen’s department. I have always felt proud to say that I was his colleague. His name, scholarship, and humanity touched so many people, both here and around the world.

My colleagues and I will remember Gaalen with great affection and gratitude. We will do our best to carry forward the work he began and the generous spirit with which he approached it. Please accept my most heartfelt condolences. I am so very sorry for your loss.

Lynda,

I am so sorry for your and Kris’ loss. I will miss Gaalen. He was a good friend and woodturning buddy.

I’m glad that he was able to play golf and spend time in his shop until the end. He was an inspiration for all of us. Although he faced incredible medical issues, he never seemed to let them dictate his life. He continued golfing and turning regardless of what was thrown at him and always had a positive outlook.

I feel fortunate that I met Gaalen and the other wood whackers after I retired. I had so much fun with him, whether it was working communally in Gaalen’s or a friend’s shop; harvesting wood in the pouring rain; getting together for a coffee or a beer; or spending an evening together with the woodturners and their wives. He was always fun to be around.

Gaalen was an incredible person, and I feel so fortunate to have known him.

Who was this guy?

He was the guy who spiked my Coke at my bachelor party, with ethanol accessed from his chemistry lab.

He was the guy who came late to my wedding because he was playing baseball.

He was the guy who convinced my wife that the kitchen renovation she wanted me to do was doable with a couple of well-placed hammer blows. He was the guy who helped me fix the mess.

He was the guy who allowed me to assist in renovating his own home. He was the guy who invited me to Sonora Island to help build a holiday cabin.

He was the guy whose life was full of projects—forecast, completed, or almost there. He was the guy who always had a fabulous red wine to bring to dinner.

He was the guy who was my closest friend. He was the guy!

Dear Lynda and Kris,

My wife and I are deeply saddened to hear this. Gaalen was an exceptional supervisor, and I feel truly fortunate to have completed my PhD under his guidance. His influence on my academic and personal life was profound. I will always remember his generosity, wisdom and encouragement, and the kindness he showed to us as students. His approach to academic life and to working with others shaped my own, and in turn had a lasting influence on the kind of academic and supervisor I became.

We also feel very fortunate to have known you both so well, and to have shared many happy times together. We will always cherish those memories. Kris, we did not get to know you well, but over the years we heard so much about you and Lisa from your mom and dad, always with great pride and affection.

I wish I had been able to send Gaalen a final message during those last few days. At the same time, I am very grateful that, not long before then, he and I were able to exchange one last set of meaningful emails. That exchange means a great deal to me, and I will treasure it.

Please accept our heartfelt condolences. Our thoughts are very much with you both, and with all your family.

When I woke up this morning and saw the message sent by a friend late last night, I learned that Gaalen had passed away. Hearing this news came as a deep shock, and it brings me immense sadness.

I started out as a private school teacher in a rural area. The fact that I was eventually able to broaden my horizons and begin understanding and researching education through new perspectives has everything to do with a few foreign friends I met back then—and Gaalen was one of the most important among them.

He and those friends transformed the way we thought, engaged in discussion, and approached our work.

The first time I met them at Zhongguancun No. 4 Primary School, I immediately felt a very distinct presence about them. They were gentle, refined, completely without pretense, and sat down naturally to chat and discuss ideas with us. So many years have passed, yet certain details remain vivid in my mind.

I remember one occasion during a group discussion when another teacher walked into the room. Gaalen immediately paused and asked us to translate what we were discussing so that the teacher could be included. It was a small gesture, but it left a profound impression on me at the time.

We often sat together chatting and brainstorming, or gathered at a friend’s place to share homemade steamed buns and cucumber with sesame sauce. Looking back, those days that seemed so ordinary then have become my warmest and most unforgettable memories.

Gaalen and his colleagues loved to ask probing questions. Whenever we discussed an issue, they would continuously ask "why?" to dive deeper. They also loved sketching out various structural diagrams to map out complex problems.

Looking back today, I realize that my own habits—my tendency to keep questioning, my impulse to structure complex issues, and my drive to think one layer deeper and ask "why" a few more times—were largely shaped by that experience.

I will always remember a time when two of them were preparing for a short 40-minute training session. Even though they had been close partners for years, they spent the entire afternoon endlessly discussing and refining the material for those 40 minutes. That dedication stayed with me. Over time, I came to understand that what appears effortless and natural on the surface is almost always built on meticulous, grounded preparation.

Centered primarily around Beijing No. 4 Primary School, we also traveled together to Shandong, Jiangsu, and Inner Mongolia—working, discussing, and sharing conversations along the way. Those shared experiences are truly unforgettable.

Looking back now, I feel more strongly than ever that Gaalen was far more than just an international friend. He was my teacher and a mentor on my educational path.

Though we spoke different languages and came from different cultural backgrounds, there was always a genuine sense of mutual appreciation, trust, and respect between us.

Some influences are not immediately obvious at the moment they happen. It is only many years later, looking back, that you realize a person's way of thinking, interacting with others, approaching work, and even their core understanding of education have subtly absorbed the indelible marks left by another.

Learning of his passing today fills my heart with deep sorrow.

I am profoundly grateful to have met Gaalen in this lifetime.

I am grateful for those days of shared discussions, journeys, meals, and passions for education.

Above all, I am grateful for the respect, inspiration, and lasting impact he bestowed upon us.

With deep remembrance of Gaalen.

May he rest in peace.

My long-time close friendship with Gaalen operated in several areas: research, teaching and learning, teacher-academic collaboration, food and wine and skiing. I can link all of these bar skiing through his understanding of and interest in exploring complexity.

Gaalen recognised that to understand and explore the things that matter in these interests it is essential to understand that you are up to your neck in what Donald Schon (whose work Gaalen valued highly) called the “messy swamp of the real world of practice”. Gaalen was always disdainful of neat, and thus simplistic analyses of and solutions to the sorts of issues of learning and teaching that were a focus of his research from his early work on students’ ideas about heat and temperature. He recognised that factors (such as the kinds of classroom talk welcomed by a teacher) that might be dismissed as mere contextual variation and not reported or explored could in fact be crucial in understanding what was going on and in plotting directions for future work.

One consequence of this was that Gaalen recognised the need to explore, learn from and develop the richly complex but often tacit wisdom held by highly skilled teachers. His complete lack of self-pretension meant that he was able to set up partnerships with teachers that were not at all top down but were partnerships of equals—though the two groups often brought different and complementary things to the table. I was privileged to attend multiple meetings of the SI2 (student intuitions/student instruction) network that he established in Vancouver. They were always warm, highly participatory and deeply reflective and analytical. It was these beliefs, attitudes and interpersonal skills that made him so effective in China (where academic-teacher relationships can be quite top-down).

It was a privilege to work with him in these sorts of endeavours. He recognised that, as one issue became better understood, new, consequential ones were revealed, that, in this journey, one never reached the ‘destination’ of final solutions—the journey WAS the destination. His ability to find ways of making sense of messy complexities was as good as anyone I have ever seen.

Although food and wine are a quite different area, Gaalen’s appreciation of complexity remained. I have been tasting and collecting wine seriously for 50 years, some of my dear friends have a somewhat simple wine palate—good, not so good, bad. Gaalen developed an excellent ‘palate’ where he could recognise and appreciate the importance of multiple aspects of what he was smelling and drinking—this drove what he bought for his cellar. After 50 years, I know quite a bit about Australian wine, but Gaalen’s knowledge of wines from the state of South Australia (which were quite widely available in BC) became clearly better than mine. When he visited each year, I would just send him down to my cellar to draw on his wisdom and select.

His approach to food was the same; there is no one that I enjoyed cooking complex dishes for more than him. He was always deeply interested in what had been done, how and why—our shared background in chemistry probably helped here. His passing leaves me with many years’ memories of very long meals at our respective homes that were always an absolute pleasure.

He was an irreplaceable friend and colleague.

Dear Lynda,

We saw the obituary for Gaalen this morning. What very sad news. We knew of Gaalen’s cancer from a chance meeting some time ago, and a friend had just filled us in on some of his most recent travails. We are so, so sorry for your and your family’s loss.

It has been a very long time since I’ve had contact with Gaalen, yet I remember him so clearly, especially his gentle smile and kindness. He had qualities which we are so in need of these days. He will, in every sense, be sorely missed.

Our hearts are with you.

Dear Lynda,

As a family, we were sorry and sad to hear the news of Gaalen’s passing. We were glad we visited you both in late June with family.

Gaalen was a wonderful mentor for me in my professional life. I first met him in 1986 in Ithaca, New York, at a conference. I remember calling my husband from New York and telling him I wanted to go to grad school in Vancouver, Canada. I was impressed that Gaalen brought teachers, like me, with him to an academic conference.

When we arrived at UBC as a family, you and Gaalen were generous and welcoming. We had the Erickson BBQ that looked like Sputnik.

Our children fondly remember following behind Gaalen on their first ski experience as kids. They say they wouldn’t be living in Canada if it weren’t for Gaalen. We all appreciate that fact.

My husband recalls Gaalen hiring him on several video projects at UBC, which kept him going in his interests and skills in a new place.

For over 40 years, we have enjoyed yours and Gaalen’s company in discovering new adventures and hobbies, as well as sharing old stories.

We miss him already. The four of us are grateful that Gaalen led an active and happy life while helping many people, like us, who crossed his path. Truly, Gaalen lived a full life, engaging in his passions.

We are looking forward to ongoing visits. We always love sharing our family stories with you, and want to hear what you are up to.

We are thankful for our time with Gaalen.

Dear Lynda and Kris,

We were deeply saddened and shocked to see in the paper this morning that Gaalen had passed away. I had received the most beautiful note from him several months ago, and we had been looking forward to having a chance to catch up with you both. It is hard to believe that we will not have that opportunity now.

How fondly we remember Gaalen and all the wonderful memories we have of him. For me especially, there was such a special connection through his work with schools in Vancouver. I was so fortunate to learn from him through the Livingstone Group—that wonderful collaboration of educators with Gaalen, who were sharing ideas around Smartboards and helping teachers like me understand how technology could truly enhance learning.

His book, Living and Learning in a SMARTBoard World, was essentially my textbook. I used it religiously and learned so much from Gaalen’s thinking and approach. He was truly a leader and architect of a movement that encouraged teachers to learn from one another through a peer-to-peer approach, rather than having technology imposed from the top down. His belief in empowering teachers made such a difference in schools. Because of his work and his generosity in sharing his knowledge, I was able to help move my own school forward in embracing technology in a meaningful way. I will always be grateful to him for that.

But beyond his professional influence, we will remember Gaalen simply as the wonderful person he was. Some of our favourite memories from all those years of renting at Whistler are very much tied to getting to know you both. We always loved our time together, and you were such a special couple. Those are memories we will treasure.

I can only imagine how difficult this must be for you and Kris, and how enormous the loss of Gaalen must feel. Please know that we are thinking of you both. Gaalen clearly touched so many lives, and I feel very fortunate that ours was one of them.