EDMONDS — Barbara Maly, one of Edmonds Community College’s founding faculty members known for her dedication to students and her ability to show how math could be applied to their daily lives, has died.
Maly, who was 69, died June 4 at Overlake Hospital Medical Center in Bellevue just weeks after being diagnosed with colon and liver cancer, her friends said.
Maly was born in Troy, New York, and attended Smith College. During her freshman year, she won the Suzan Rose Benedict Prize for outstanding math student.
In 1967, she began her master’s degree studies in math at the University of Washington, where she met fellow math student Richard Fuhr. They went on to become lifelong friends.
“Having a good quality teacher is rare to find,” he said. “It’s important and can make the difference for students.”
Maly joined the Edmonds Community College faculty in 1976 and taught there until her retirement in June 2013.
When she came to the campus it was so new that “they had trailers in dirt lots,” said Marty Cavalluzzi, who came to know Maly as vice president for instruction.
Cavalluzzi now is president of Pierce College’s Puyallup campus.
Cavalluzzi said Maly’s classes were filled with a mix of students, those who wanted to be challenged in math: Those for whom the subject created some anxiety and students who were the first in their family to attend college.
“In a single class, you have that full spectrum,” he said. “You have to get them to the same outcomes by the end of the quarter. She excelled at it.”
Maly would often bring newspapers to class to give them specific examples of how math could be used in their every day lives. “She was always showing them that you’re using math more than you think, you just don’t think of it as math,” he said.
Maly became head of the college’s math department and served as president of the faculty union for five years.
Although that could have brought them into conflict, Cavalluzzi said that was far from the way she would bring potential problems to him.
“We had the most respectful relationship,” he said. “We could discuss issues from both sides.”
When the issue involved money, she would often come to him saying, “Let me show you how we can make that up.”
“She was such a big- picture thinker,” Cavalluzzi said. “It was so rare. I miss that. I miss her.”
Sharon Salyer: 425-339-3486; salyer@heraldnet.com.
Celebration of life
A celebration of life for Barbara Maly is scheduled for 2 p.m. Sept. 17 on the Edmonds Community College campus. A scholarship fund has been established in her name to benefit the college’s liberal arts programs. Information is available at www.edcc.edu/foundation.
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