“I'll come back as a beadle”
Annelies Verschuren-Dirks retires after 26 years of service to TU/e
Read more- The University , People
- 28/06/2021
“I'll come back as a beadle”
Anyone who spends some time on the campus knows her by sight, as the woman who presents the flowers at festivities. What some do not know is that behind the scenes Annelies Verschuren-Dirks is the engine driving countless events, from Founders' Day to Glow. Or rather 'was' because at the start of July she is retiring. Leaving, after twenty-six years and with a heart full of memories: of the smell of the W-Hal, for example, and of all the dear people she has met along the way. But, “If at all possible, I'll come back as a beadle.”
A Bernese Mountain Dog wagging its tail greets Cursor at the garden gate. This is Amber. “She had a litter of puppies this year. That was possible because I was working from home,” tells Annelies Verschuren-Dirks. With dogs being so popular during corona, there was a waiting list of takers for the pups.
Corona also brought Verschuren new experiences in her working life: suddenly, all the university's events, such as the Academic Year Opening and MomenTUm, had to be organized for the online arena. Could she muster some enthusiasm for all the novelties of the virtual world, so shortly before retiring? She laughs; this soon-to-be pensionada is in her element on the internet. “I spent a long time in municipal politics in Son and social media was a key aspect of my work there – I wouldn't be surprised if I've got three thousand contacts on LinkedIn.”
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Her council work stopped when she and her husband Rob moved to a small farm outside Breugel, just over the municipality boundary. She points sadly towards the barn belonging to her neighbors opposite: “Behind that is Son. The VVD party in Sint Oedenrode – the municipality where we now officially live – asked whether I would like to work for them, but Son is the municipality where I had lived my entire married life and where my heart lies.”
Verschuren also feels a bond with TU/e, one that has always been at its strongest during PhD conferral ceremonies. “Reading the summary of one of those theses, I'd always feel so proud of the university. 'And to think I'm a part of this!' would go through my mind.”
Plan in mind
Her connection with TU/e began in 1995, in the Paviljoen building. By then Verschuren already had an impressive résumé. On leaving secondary education this building contractor's daughter, the eldest of five, went to work at Philips Nederland. “My father remodeled the home of someone who worked there and they tipped him off about a job for me.” With courses in shorthand, typing and business correspondence, she gained secretarial skills. More employers and more responsibilities followed. When she became a mother, she continued to work one day a week.
Then, when the children – two girls, two boys – started school, Verschuren was keen to increase her hours. It was 1995 and through Manpower she was able to cover for someone on maternity leave in Professor Peter Sander's group (IE&IS, since retired). “We used to have a cozy little office, I remember the Paviljoen's wooden floor. Every afternoon at three thirty we would drink tea together.” More temporary positions came her way – “I'd hear at the photocopier that someone had gone off sick with a bad back’ – and so three years, the maximum length of time she could be seconded to a single organization, flew by.
“I wanted to stay at TU/e so I applied for a job here.” Verschuren became secretary to Harry Timmermans, dean of Built Environment. She got to know university secretary Harry Roumen, who would play a key role in shaping her career. “He had a different plan in mind for me.”
Cheese cubes
Roumen's plan soon took effect. In 2000 he asked both Verschuren and Elly Duran to set up the Office of Doctoral Presentations and Academic Ceremonies. Verschuren started organizing PhD conferral ceremonies, as well as the inauguration speeches and farewell lectures given by professors, occasions that had previously been arranged by the departments themselves. “This way some consistency could be brought to the proceedings. Convivial receptions before and after events were introduced, with finger food, although Executive Board member Willem Te Beest found a slice of sausage and a cheese cube did the job perfectly well.” A new event became the gatherings for new appointees, professors who had taken up their post in the same period.
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In her new role, Verschuren found herself taking over more tasks from secretary Roumen. “I'm a natural organizer. At times, my interference must have driven some of my colleagues to distraction. For instance, every presentation had to be tested. Not on the computer, not on just any OHP, but on the OHP in the Blauwe Zaal, in my presence.”
Beadle
With the surge in the number of PhD conferral ceremonies, more and more beadles were hired to announce ‘hora est’. Together with Cees Heijmans, then financial director of Built Environment, Verschuren created a group of seven beadles, who regularly meet to discuss matters and also enjoy the occasional work outing.
“Since retiring, my husband Rob, who used to teach Dutch, has also become a beadle. I like the idea of becoming one too because the PhD conferral ceremonies are close to my heart. When you see the sense of achievement on the face of the doctoral candidate! If at all possible, I'll come back as a beadle.”
Ambiance
A willingness to arrange everything down to the last detail is very much is Verschuren's nature, but no less so is an attentiveness to the human dimension. “A bonbon with the coffee, water for the flowers, someone who guides you to your seat: it is important that guests feel welcome.”
Informal internal conviviality is another realm with which she has long been involved: she used to organize galas for the Faculty Club (an association, now passed into history, for professors and emeriti) and used to arrange for the Christmas decorations in the former Hoofdgebouw, the Auditorium and MetaForum.
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Quite simply, she has a strong feeling for ambiance and hospitality. “I always think, how would I do this at home?” Evidence that she does indeed entertain at home is provided by the smoker still standing on the terrace. She and Rob recently organized the first trip for their neighborhood since corona: trout fishing followed by smoking the catch.
Being sensitive to ambiance, Verschuren finds it essential to be on good terms with her colleagues. She paints her former colleagues in terms like 'incredibly kind', 'considerate', and 'so nice', and with many of them she is still friends. “When there's a poor atmosphere in the office, I up and leave. Fortunately, that's rarely been necessary at TU/e.“
Terrifically proud
Over the years, Verschuren has assisted the rectors Martin Rem, Rutger van Santen and Hans van Duijn with PhD conferral ceremonies. “When the present rector Frank Baaijens took up his position, I was already focusing on the major academic ceremonies like the Academic Year Opening, Founders' Day and the New Year's reception.”
In addition, she has left her mark on a great many events and projects, including four lustrums, the Academic Awards, the Marina van Damme grant, MomenTUm and the Alliance: a collaboration in the field of Challenge Based Learning with Wageningen University, Utrecht University and UMC Utrecht.
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Personally, she is fond of recalling GLOW, the annual light art festival, when it was held on campus in the lustrum years 2006, 2011 and 2016. “After a week like that, I would feel terrifically proud of TU/e, and grateful to be working here.” Together with students and her colleagues in security, the fire service, real estate and technical support, and under the supervision of Professor and Dean of Physics Gerrit Kroesen, she has realized some thirty light projects on the campus. “It was fabulous bringing artists, students and employees together to create something beautiful, like Exploding Wires, an installation that simulated lightning.”
One of the artworks, Transformation, still stands on campus and can be admired in triplicate. This is thanks to the efforts of the Art Committee and Verschuren. In the evening these cylinders of weathering steel project the words ‘TU/e, where innovation starts’ and mathematical formulas are whispered.
Varied
When Verschuren transferred to the Communication Expertise Center (CEC) in 2010, she took the organization of the academic events with her. “No fewer than seven different colleagues will be taking over my tasks, spread among General Affairs, CEC and a department.”
With CEC she crisscrossed the campus. “I moved office from Laplace to the Auditorium, Metaforum, Kennispoort and finally Atlas. And the last eighteen months she has spent working from home due to corona.” The work too was very varied. “Harry Roumen would sometimes grumble, ‘You're always looking for something different!’ but at CEC this proved to be an advantage. Of all the places I've worked this is probably where I learned the most: about student recruitment, relationship management, internet and online events.”
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Nonetheless, slowly Verschuren began to feel, well, a little disgruntled. Times change, the university changes and perhaps her own outlook too. She is apologetic. “Complaining like that, it's a symptom of my age”. But still, in the past you could arrange something just like that with a colleague; now you have to send an official mail. And every event needs its own 25-page safety plan. We have ended up in “the land of rules”, she concludes.
Daunted
Verschuren values the dynamic environment at CEC, working with many young colleagues, likewise the scope she was given to reduce her workload gradually, but she does miss the intimate Brabant conviviality of days gone by. “For me, Harry Roumen's retirement in 2012 marked the switch to a more businesslike era.”
She first acknowledged the writing on the wall when found herself not looking forward to but feeling daunted by a lustrum year full of big events. “That's another symptom of age.” And so she made a decision. To use her overtime (accumulated during peak times organizing events) and outstanding vacation hours (during corona) to enable her to retire not this fall but before the summer. “But it has already been agreed, the first ‘live’ event that CEC organizes, I'll be there and we'll say goodbye in person!”
Friendships
What remains are the friendships that Verschuren has built up over the years in the various departments. The memories of all those people, and of the campus, so changed since 1995: the wooden floor of the Paviljoen building, the Faraday's cage in the Electrical Engineering lab, and the lingering smell in the W-Hal – where MetaForum now stands. “It was the smell of industry, pure and simple. Wonderful.”
Now the time has come for other things: babysitting her two grandsons, embroidery, gardening, reading and Netflix. “Getting up in the morning and thinking, 'What shall I do today?' What a luxurious position to be in.” But as soon as there's a vacancy for a beadle, she'll be the first in line to apply.
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