Professor Giselle Byrnes

Massey University

Professor Giselle Byrnes is Provost at Massey University Te Kunenga ki Pūrehuroa, Aotearoa New Zealand, where she is responsible for providing leadership to learning and teaching, academic innovation and quality assurance, in addition to supporting research and research commercialisation across the University. As Provost, Giselle is responsible for driving excellence in teaching and academic development alongside maintaining Massey’s leadership role in distance, online/digitally enabled and blended education.

An experienced leader in the Australasian higher education sector, Giselle has senior management experience working for universities on both sides of the Tasman, including serving as Faculty Pro Vice-Chancellor at Charles Darwin University. Trained as an historian, Giselle’s major research and teaching contributions have centred on the dynamics and politics of settler-indigenous histories, public history and national history-writing. A former Fulbright Scholar, she has a strong commitment to driving initiatives that enhance access, equity and excellence in higher education and sees distance and digitally enabled education as critical in addressing social, cultural and historical inequities.