Molly Brennan born Mary Brennan (1914 – 2012) was an Australian headteacher. She was the first woman to lead a large secondary school in Victoria that was not a girls' school.
Molly Brennan | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Mary Brennan 1914 |
| Died | 2012 |
| Nationality | Australian |
| Education | University of Melbourne |
| Known for | Headteacher and feminist |
Life
editBrennan was born in the Bendigo suburb of Sedgwick in 1914.[1] Her Catholic parents were Mary Anne (born Conway) and Richard Brennan. Her paternal aunt was the leading lawyer Anna Brennan and her uncles were the politicians Thomas Brennan and Frank Brennan.
She completed her education at the University of Melbourne where she had studied the family's subject of the law. This was at the time of the depression and finding that there was a shortage of teachers she abandoned her ambition to be an articled clerk. She spent the next thirty years working in different schools applying for new positions after two or three years in order to gain promotion. Secondary school's were short of women teachers and they were willing to offer better positions to ambitious single women.[2][3]
Preston Girl's High School had opened in 1928.[4] She was promoted to her first headship there.
Brighton High School was the first co-educational school of more than a thousand pupils in the State of Victoria to be led by a woman. The state had removed the gender barrier and this had led to several girls schools being led by men.However no woman was leading any large school that was not a girl's school. The headship at Brighton High School became vacant and Molly Brennan applied. She became the head here in 1970 after she appealed against an initial decision to appoint a less qualified man. The library here is named for her.[1]
In 1974 she tried to repeat her success by applying to be the head of Melbourne High School for boys. She again appealled when a less qualified man was appointed, but this time with no success. Although she had made a political point.[1]
She was the head of what is now called Castlemaine Secondary College for two years until she retired in 1977.[5]
Brennan died in 2012 in Bendigo.[1]
References
edit- ^ a b c d "Brennan, Molly". AWR. Retrieved 2024-09-16.
- ^ Towns, Deborah (2011). "'It's a Woman': Molly Brennan and Gender, Social Justice and Leadership in the Victorian Education Department, 1960s and 1970s in Founders, firsts and feminists : women leaders in twentieth-century Australia / edited by Fiona Davis, Nell Musgrove and Judith Smart" (PDF). Fao History Council of Victoria – via History Council of Victoria, c/- RHSV, 239 A’Beckett Street, Melbourne.
- ^ Melbourne, Australian Women's Archives Project and The University of. "Founders, Firsts and Feminists: Women Leaders in Twentieth-century Australia". www.womenaustralia.info. Retrieved 2024-09-16.
- ^ "Preston Girls High School". Learning from the Past. Retrieved 2024-09-16.
- ^ Melbourne, The University of. "Brennan, Molly - Woman - The Encyclopedia of Women and Leadership in Twentieth-Century Australia". www.womenaustralia.info. Retrieved 2024-09-16.