Laurene Vaughan PhD is Professor of Design at RMIT University. She served as Founding Dean of the School of Design (2018-2022). Laurene was invited to the position of Nierenberg Chair, Distinguished Professor of Design, at Carnegie Mellon University, 2012 – 2013. Internationally recognised as a leader in interdisciplinary and applied design research, her research, leadership and creative practice takes numerous forms. Laurene’s research investigates the interactive and situated nature of cultural production, place, care, and design methods and practices that enable this – both analogue and digital. She was a lead researcher on the Circus Oz Living Archive Project (archive.circusoz.com) and co-editor of Performing Digital (Palgrave). Her most recent edited collections are Practice Based Design Research and Design as a Practice of Care (2017, 2019, Bloomsbury Academic). Laurene was Chief Investigator on the Design for a Wellbeing research project with Bendigo Hospital, and is a member of the Design and Care network at RMIT. She has extensive experience in graduate research education, and was lead CI on the Design, Architecture, Practice Research (DAPr) national research project funded through the (Australian Learning and Teaching Council).