Prof. Stuart Batten was born and raised on a farm in country Victoria.

In addition to his research and numerous publications, he has also had a long and ongoing commitment to education at all levels. As well as his extensive undergraduate teaching, he has made significant and lasting contributions to postgraduate training, in particular through co-founding the Australasian Crystallography School in 2008 (to which he still contributes), and reviving the then defunct Victorian RACI Inorganic Symposium Day in 2004. Both these activities target postgraduate students and continue to run and prosper to this day. At the other end of the education timeline, he has also made substantial and unique contributions to STEM education at primary and secondary school level through his numerous outreach projects (described here), representation of Monash on the Chemistry Education Association committee, and coordination and running of most of the School of Chemistry’s school outreach activities.