Catherine works in the Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences at Monash University as an Associate Professor, teaching research in post-graduate courses. She is co-director of the Criminal Justice Research Consortium (CJRC).

Catherine is actively engaged in a range of collaborative research projects. Recent/current research includes: exploring the trajectories toward criminalisation for young women who go missing; a national mapping of the needs of children who experience parental incarceration; learning from young people who have experienced the imprisonment of a parent – centring their expertise and voices; and exploring assessment feedback processes in a Master of Social Work program. In 2024 she co-edited a special issue of Current Issues in Criminal Justice with Dr Natalia Hanley (University of Wollongong) on technology-assisted prison visiting, and was an invited guest editor, with Dr Rachel Naylor (Ulster University) for Child Care in Practice.

Before joining the Social Work Department at Monash, Catherine worked in direct practice for ten years sharing her time between Australia and Northern Ireland. Her direct practice experiences and interests include: casework with marginalised young people, including those in contact with the criminal legal system; young parents; and family violence.  Her recent books include co-authored texts: Co-production and Criminal Justice (with Drs Diana Johns, Maggie Hall, Claire Spivakovsky and Shelley Turner) and Research in Social work and Social care (2nd ed, 2025) (with Assoc. Prof. Fiona McDermott).