Beloved teacher Christine Liu dies

Christine Yu-Ting Liu, beloved Baldwin Senior High School teacher and choir director, died Aug. 2 after a two-year battle with cancer. She is survived by her mother, father, sister, brother, sister-in-law, two nieces, two nephews, and her dog, Gizmo. Ms. Liu was 40.

The following is a tribute to Ms. Liu written by Baldwin High School alumnus Sam Schoenberg ’09.

For those not fortunate enough to have known Ms. Christine Liu, any description I could provide here would be insufficient. She was an indescribably wonderful teacher, mentor, musician and human being. She earned my, and my peers’, undying respect with a drive that was unbending, a passion that was palpable and teaching that was incomparable.
But what made Ms. Liu a beloved figure was her zest for life, boundless optimism and, above all, love for and devotion to her students. She was a force of nature, that rare combination of dynamism and warmth that brought us all light and joy. That she was able to maintain her vivacity, her joie de vivre, even in the darkest and most dismal of circumstances revealed a strength of character and personality that is beyond rare. It was almost otherworldly. For many of her students, like me, last week marked the loss not only of an inspirational teacher but of a close friend and beloved family member.
It is difficult to describe Ms. Liu without sounding clichéd because the only accurate descriptions of her are superlatives. She was the most energetic, most caring, most dedicated, most brilliant, most committed, most extraordinary teacher and person. And yet she was the farthest thing from a cliché. She was one of a kind, irreplaceable.
Her accomplishments were numerous and impressive. I’m sure she was proud — she certainly had every reason to be — of her Ivy League education (she received one of her three master’s degrees from Yale), her leadership of both the Baldwin High School concert and women’s choirs to highest honors at NYSSMA and other competitions, her professional-quality operatic voice and her college-level teaching in A.P. and honors classes in Baldwin.