Shelton Peiris did his PhD at Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria. After graduation from Monash in 1987, he tutored at Department of Econometrics (Monash University), lectured at the University of Moratuwa and the University of Melbourne before joining what was then the Statistics Department in 1990. He has been here ever since except for visiting appointments at the University of Waterloo (1993), the University of Manitoba (1997), the University of Iowa (1997), Thaksin University (1998), Pennsylvania State University (2002) and University of Malaya (2007, 2010, 2012/2013).

Shelton was the chair of the international program committee for international conference in Colombo, December 2011.

He was a council member and treasurer of the SSAI (Statistical Society of Australia Inc.) NSW branch (2003-2006). He has organised a number of workshops and invited paper sessions in Australia and overseas. He is an elected member of ISI. He has been the Director of Statistics Teaching Program (2005-2006) and from 2011.

He is a Sub Dean (Student Affairs) of the Faculty of Science.