Professor May Cheng is currently Associate Vice President (Academic Affairs), Registrar and Chair Professor of Teacher Education of The Education University of Hong Kong.

Professor Cheng graduated from The University of Hong Kong and received a BSc (First Class Hons) degree in Zoology, a Certificate in Education (Distinction) and a Master in Education. She obtained her PhD at the University of Waikato, New Zealand. She is now a fellow of the Royal Society of Biology, the UK. She is the current President of the East Asian Association for Science Education (EASE).

Prior to the current appointment, Professor Cheng was a Reader in Professional Education at the Department of Education, University of Oxford from 2010 to the end of 2011, and a fellow of the Governing Body at Kellogg College. Professor Cheng has started teacher education work at the Sir Robert College of Education in Hong Kong and been a long-serving member of The Education University of Hong Kong and has taken up various academic leadership positions. She has served as Acting Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Associate Dean (Programmes) and Programme Director. Earlier roles included Deputy Head of Department and Programme Leader. She has extensive tertiary teaching experience and has taught in undergraduate, postgraduate diploma, Master of Education, and Doctor of Education programmes in the areas of Biology Education, Science Education and General Studies. She has also served on subject committees at the Hong Kong Examination and Assessment Authority and the Curriculum Development Council in subject areas including Biology, Science Education and Science and Technology.

Professor Cheng’s main areas of research are teacher education and science education. She researches in inquiry learning, assessment for learning, and the nature of science, with a focus on teacher learning and teacher professional development. She has published extensively in international referred journals, and has published book chapters on teacher education and science education. More recently she has edited the book Science Education in International Contexts, highlighting the contribution of education researchers from Asia and international contexts. She has been successful in obtaining various research grants from the General Research Fund, the Quality Education Fund and the Education Bureau.

Professor Cheng has had active participation in and made contributions to the international science education arena. She is has been an International committee member of the National Association for Research in Science Teaching (NARST in the US) and has chartered status as a fellow of the Royal Society of Biology. She is on the editorial boards of the Journal of Quality School Education, and the Asia-Pacific Forum on Science Learning and Teaching [On-line Available: http://www.ied.edu.hk/apfslt/]. She is a reviewer for a number of international journals and associations. In 2008, she received a Certificate of Merit, Quality Education Fund (QEF), Hong Kong for the international project “A Schools Around the World project for teachers’ professional development via setting standards for students’ learning” in collaboration with researchers in the US, Japan, Australia, Germany, Portugal, Czechoslovakia and France.