In high school, when a teacher wheeled an ancient TV cart into the classroom and dimmed the lights, it was time to check out. A glorious free period of inattentiveness.

But when Dr. Noreen Golfman screened a film in one of her university classes, the experience was something else entirely. It was time to tune in.

She taught her film classes, and all her English courses at Memorial, with a fierce intelligence and a sense of humour. She could speak her students’ language, only better.

Throughout the 1990s, she was as close to a celebrity as one could find on a university campus. Movie reviewer on the evening news, leader of a notoriously challenging aerobics class, and regularly voted a “most popular prof” in the early days of the Maclean’s University Guide.

Her film studies classes were filled with students from all disciplines, and she introduced a more vibrant and diverse film experience to a whole generation of students.

These were classes to remember.

Dr. Golfman was born in Montreal in 1952. She completed her master’s and doctoral degrees at the University of Western Ontario and joined Memorial’s Department of English in 1984.

In 1989, she founded the St. John's International Women's Film Festival, now the second-longest-running women's film festival in the world. And in 1991, she started the MUN Cinema Series. 

Dr. Noreen Golfman at work in 2013. Photo from Memorial University Archives.

 

As dean of the School of Graduate Studies from 2008 to 2014, she expanded fellowship and scholarship opportunities for students, and enrolment in Memorial’s graduate programs doubled.

In 2014, she was appointed provost and vice-president (academic), a role she held until 2020. Along the way, she helped transform Memorial's administrative structure and was instrumental in establishing the position of vice-president (equity, diversity, inclusion and anti-racism).  

In the world beyond campus, if she wasn’t building something from the ground up, she was saving it from falling down.

She served on the board of directors for the LSPU Hall and helped lead the renovations. For several years, she chaired the board of the Winterset in Summer Literary Festival.

She currently serves as co-chair of Business and Arts N.L. She’s the vice-chair of the Newfoundland and Labrador Film Development Corporation (now known as PictureNL), and chair of the board for Friends of Canadian Broadcasting.

Through these roles, Dr. Golfman has worked to bridge the gap between the arts and the business community to foster partnerships for the good of the province's cultural and economic landscape.

In 2011, she received the Memorial University President's Award for Exceptional Community Service. In 2013, she was given the Newfoundland and Labrador Arts Council Hall of Honour Award, and in 2019 she was ACTRA’s National Woman of the Year.

In 2023, Atlantic Business Magazine named her one of Atlantic Canada's 25 Most Powerful Women in Business, and in that same year, she became a member of the Order of Newfoundland and Labrador.

To recognize her enduring influence, Memorial established the Dr. Noreen Golfman Graduate Fellowship, supporting graduate students who demonstrate academic excellence and leadership potential.

In 2025, she’ll receive an honorary degree from Memorial University.

It’s difficult to summarize the contributions of an individual who has played so many roles.

How can we forget that she performed as Ariel Flint on the CBC Radio comedy The Great Eastern or that she once played a corpse on Hatching, Matching and Dispatching?

The list goes on.

But when the credits roll on Memorial’s first 100 years, we see that Dr. Golfman has played a leading role in the intellectual and cultural life of our university and in the wider world beyond.