A graduate of Indiana University, Kathleen Claussen was awarded the Wells Senior Recognition Award upon matriculation, and obtained a graduate degree in International Politics and Conflict Resolution as a 2006 Mitchell Scholar at Queen's University Belfast.

Kathleen spent a semester as an intern at the U.S. Embassy in Trinidad and a summer working as an intern at the European Parliament primarily dealing with human rights issues. While at IU, Kathleen founded and directed the Community Service Corps, an umbrella group linking and coordinating student service organizations on campus. In 2005, she launched Conversations About Service and Engagement, an organization sponsoring international videoconference connections among universities to discuss global citizenship and world problems. More than 100 students from 15 countries have participated in the first year. She has been active in AID (Americans for Informed Democracy), a non-profit promoting discussion and training on global issues, serving on its international board of directors as well as its local co-president. She was a national student board member of the American Democracy Project, which fosters undergraduate civic education and engagement across the country.

Apart from her academic research, she has learned more about the politics of Northern Ireland through her internship at Democratic Dialogue, a think tank carrying out an assessment of the "state of democracy" in Northern Ireland. Kathleen is interning this summer for two months in the Caucasus at the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies. She is now in her second year at Yale Law School.