Doctor of the Week – Dr Marike Du Plooy

Students at Southern Hills who choose to pursue an academic pathway in senior years are enjoying a healthy outlook. 

That’s right – there is a doctor in the house!

Dr Marike grew up in Boksberg (outside of Johannesburg) and studied a PhD in Medical Biochemistry at the University of Capetown. A post-doctoral Fellowship saw her giving lectures to undergraduates – and that’s where the passion for teaching students began.

A family move to Australia then spurred study into a Graduate Diploma through ECU Joondalup and now Southern Hills students are learning Physics and Chemistry from a teacher who certainly knows her way around generators, electric motors and the periodic table of elements!

What drives an Christian intellectual to teach teenagers about Physics and Chemistry?

“To have senior students asking me about evolution, the big bang theory and to be able to explain God’s perfect plan to these young enquiring minds – that is what they deserve and those are the discussions that shape their thinking when they are enquiring and shaping their views of the world,” says Marike as her Year 12’s work through a very complicated robotics model in the pristine surroundings at Southern Hills Christian College.

Dr Du Plooy calls Carey Baptist Church her home church now that she has spent some time growing accustomed to life in Australia.

“It truly is a community church, in the sense that our GP goes there, the shopkeeper goes there. The people from our neighbourhood worship God together with me, my husband and my young son.”

How does a super-intelligent professor make sense of COVID-19?

“Just like everyone else! Our playground routine in the afternoon became playing around the house! Having said that, I am really looking forward to life getting back to normal – the playground is the perfect environment for a two-year-old boy with heaps of energy.” Keep an eye out for the Doctor next time you are around the Southern Hills campus!

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