Trevor Wilson Life Membership

Trevor Wilson is to be honoured this evening for his outstanding contribution to the Auckland Mathematical Association.

Trevor moved from Wellington in 1974 and took up a position at Hillary College. Shortly afterhebecame a member of the AMA Executive, a position that he would hold for over 20 years. For two years in the late 1970’s he was the Secretary of the Association before taking on responsibility as Editor of the New Zealand Mathematics Magazine. After relinquishing this position he became the Association’s Mathex Organiser while continuing on as the Assistant Editor for a number of years

At this time Mathex was held in the Auckland Museum and was mainly an exhibition of student work along with quizzes for individual students and teams of four (without the running around).
The exhibition moved to MOTAT after a time, and with Trevor still in charge the decision was made to expand the quiz evening to the format which it largely has today. The quiz eveningwas held at the YMCA in Pitt Street, beforemoving to the ASB Stadium in Kohimarama.

Those of us who have been involved in Mathex in recent times will appreciate the huge amount of work that organising the event involves. Much of preparatory work goes unnoticed and there would have been much sacrifice of professional and family time.

When Trevor did decide to stand down from the Executive Committee and hand over Mathex to others, he retained his involvement in the Association by becoming a member of the Mathematics Trust Board, an organisation which disburses funds for the benefit of Mathematics. Trevor had been there at the very beginning when the Trust was established and he would have added considerable experience and knowledge to those trustees as they went about their task.

While Trevor’s links with the Executive and the Trust Board came to an end in 2003 he has been a welcome and constant presence at AGM’s and Professional Development days over the intervening years. Trevor is the type of person who prefers to work in the background. He has nonetheless earned a reputation as a hard worker; a person of wise counsel; and some-one who can always be relied upon to finish a task to a high standard. We recognise that this evening.

A.R. Carey

11 March 2015