Professor Francis Mitrou

Professor Francis Mitrou is UWA Node Director and a Chief Investigator of The Life Course Centre.

He is Senior Principal Research Fellow and Head of the Human Development and Community Wellbeing Team at The Kids Research Institute Australia, and Principal Research Fellow at the Centre for Child Health Research at the University of Western Australia (UWA). He is supported by the prestigious Stan Perron Charitable Foundation People Fellowship.

Professor Mitrou is an economist by training and spent his early career at the Australian Bureau of Statistics working on macro-economic indicators and national population surveys. By applying a life course approach to human development research and program evaluation, his research aims to improve outcomes for disadvantaged children and families and prevent entrenchment of costly disadvantage. He is a designer, contributor to, and user of research datasets on socially and developmentally vulnerable children and families. He has expertise in survey development, linked administrative data, child development, Indigenous human development, mental health and addiction, and economic evaluation.

Francis is also Portfolio Lead of the ARC Life Course Centre’s Data for Policy Portfolio, which engages government human services and data agencies in policy relevant research activity.