The ADL Mountain States Region welcomes Kelsey Grim as a 2020-21 intern! Kelsey will be working remotely with the Mountain States team and is also participating in two national research projects.

Born and raised in Denver, CO, Kelsey is very excited about the opportunity to intern with ADL Mountain States Region and get more involved with the community she calls home. Kelsey graduated from Arizona State University in 2016 with a B.A. in Communication, where she focused her studies on interpersonal relations and social influence. She spent the next few years traveling the world and working in a variety of industries and environments, including volunteering with women in Tanzania, researching discourse in China, and mountaineering in the Himalayas of Nepal and India. Kelsey is active in the outdoors and worked a few seasons as a backpacking and climbing field instructor for the National Outdoor Leadership School, refining her ability to work with diverse groups and under extreme pressure and unpredictable environments.

Upon settling back in Denver full time she became involved with the immigrant and refugee communities in the city, working primarily with the International Rescue Committee in Denver. The combination of her experiences interacting with other cultures abroad and working with local vulnerable populations helped spark her desire to return to school. As a current graduate student in the Master of Social Sciences program at the University of Colorado – Denver, Kelsey is on the Social Justice track and pursuing a Women and Gender Studies Certificate. Her research focuses on power dynamics and the prescription of value within hierarchical systems, episodes and patterns of mass violence and genocide, and extremism and radicalization.

Kelsey has followed the work of ADL and other antisemitism and anti-hate organizations for the past several years and admires the comprehensive work that ADL does throughout the country and around the world. Her assistance this year will be instrumental to the Mountain States Region’s critical initiatives.

Kelsey’s drive to pursue a career, but more importantly a life, inspired by combating hate, educating people about the history of inequality, antisemitism, and mass violence, and encouraging a more empathetic and thoughtful country and world, makes her a key part of our regional team. We are so glad to welcome Kelsey to the ADL family.