Rate My Professor Josephine May

Josephine May is an Honorary Associate Professor in the Pathways and Academic Learning Support (History) at the University of Newcastle, Australia. She holds a PhD, Bachelor of Arts (Honours), Bachelor of Arts, and Graduate Diploma of Education, all from the University of Newcastle. Her career at the university spanned over two decades until her retirement in 2015, during which she served as Lecturer in the School of Humanities and Social Science from 2004 to 2008, Senior Lecturer from 2009 to 2013, and Associate Professor in the Centre for English Language and Foundation Studies from 2013. An award-winning lecturer, she received the Vice-Chancellor's Citation for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning in 2012, the New South Wales Quality Teaching Award from the Australian College of Educators in 2007, Lecturer of the Year in 2009, Teacher Recognition Award in 2009, and Excellence Award in 2009.

Primarily a historian of education specialising in the history of Australian education, Josephine May's research interests include entry pathways to higher education, experiences of first-in-family students, visual representations of educational subjects, and the impacts of gender, class, age, race, ethnicity, and memory. Key publications encompass Reel Schools: Schooling and the Nation in Australian Cinema (2013), Portraying Lives: Headmistresses and Women Professors 1880s-1940s co-authored with Tanya Fitzgerald (2016), Claiming a Voice: The First Thirty-Five Years of the Australian Teacher Education Association (2009), and First-in-Family Students, University Experience and Family Life: Motivations, Transitions and Participation (second edition 2024). Her articles appear in journals including History of Education Review, Australian Journal of Adult Learning, Journal of Australian Studies, and Paedagogica Historica. May contributes to editorial boards such as History of Education Review and was inaugural Chair of the Dictionary of Educational History in Australia and New Zealand Editorial Board. She was President of the Australian and New Zealand History of Education Society (2011-2012), executive member of the International Australian Studies Association (2004-2008), and chaired the Inaugural Australian Enabling Educators Conference. Currently, she is working on a book-length study of the first female principals in NSW secondary girls schools.