Associate Professor Wendy Stone leads the research group that was awarded the 2016 Vice Chancellor's Research Excellence Award in recognition of outstanding housing and urban research and its impact. Wendy is Academic Leader of the Housing Opportunity & Spatial Equity Theme within the Centre for Urban Transitions and is Director of the AHURI Swinburne Research Centre. Wendy holds numerous Category 1 competitive ARC and AHURI research grants and industry awards. She is leader of the annual national housing scholars' symposium, publishes for academic and community audiences, is engaged in policy development and debate in housing issues, is a regular media contributor and supervises higher degree research students. Specialising in the use of innovative quantitative and qualitative methodologies to address policy-oriented research questions, Wendy has an extensive policy-research record, most notably in the fields of family and community wellbeing, children/young people's housing, housing aspirations and innovative policies to address these, income, wealth and life-opporutnity inequalities and social inclusion/social capital. Previously, Wendy held senior positions at the Australian Institute of Family Studies and the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute (AHURI Ltd).