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Klein selected for 2021 LGBTQIA+ Advocacy Award

LB Klein, Ph.D.LB Klein is the graduate and professional student recipient of the 2021 LGBTQI+ Advocacy Award. The award, presented by UNC’s LGBT Center, recognizes contributions to or advocacy on behalf of LGBTQIA+ communities at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Klein, who graduated this month from the School of Social Work’s Ph.D. program, was recently recognized for the honor at the University’s Lavender Graduation.

For more than 16 years, Klein has been working to prevent interpersonal violence, support survivors, and advance LGBTQ+ equity. Her dissertation, “Campus sexual and relationship violence and LGBTQ+ students: Implications for prevention,” included research funded by the National LGBTQ Institute on IPV and the UNC Injury Prevention Research Center.

Klein’s commitment to the University community included serving as the chair of the UNC Gender-Based Violence Prevention Advisory Group, where she worked to ensure that members centered the experiences of marginalized students, including LGBTIQA+ students; BIPOC students, and students with disabilities. In addition, she taught undergraduate and graduate social work courses, and worked with the UNC Gender-Based Violence Research Group.

Klein’s nomination noted that her research and focus at Carolina furthered the work on gender-based violence and “ensured it is rooted in intersectionality and social change.”

A 2020 UNC School of Social Work Doctoral Student of the Year, Klein recently was awarded the Anna Julia Cooper Post-Doctoral Fellow. Following her fellowship, she will begin work in August 2022 as an assistant professor in the Sandra Rosenbaum School of Social Work at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.