Lori Crowder, PhD

Lori brings over 20 years of experience advancing both local and national efforts to end gender-based and community violence. Since joining ALSO in 2007, Lori has led the organization’s work as Executive Director, designing and managing initiatives that support in-risk populations through training, technical assistance, and community-building strategies. Her leadership bridges direct service, systems change, and national capacity-building to prevent and respond to violence in all its forms.

Lori began her career at a nonprofit organization in New York City, where she managed a federally funded national initiative focused on prisoner reentry and domestic violence. There, she led training, technical assistance, and research to help jurisdictions across the country build cross-sector supports for returning prisoners and their families. Prior to that, she managed social services for public housing residents in Queens.

Her research focuses on the impact of correctional supervision on intimate partner relationships. Lori’s publications include “Managing Ties and Time: Men’s and Women’s Reports of Relationships during Incarceration and Reentry” (dissertation, 2018), and “Prisoner Reentry and Intimate Partner Violence in the African American Community: The Case for Culturally Competent Interventions” (Journal of the Institute of Justice and International Studies, 2004), co-authored with Oliver Williams and others.

In addition to her advocacy and executive leadership, Lori is an educator. She has taught social work courses at the City University of New York and the UIC Jane Addams College of Social Work, and currently teaches social welfare policy in the MSW program at Governors State University.

Lori holds a B.S. from the University of Texas at Arlington, an M.S. from Columbia University School of Social Work, and a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Chicago Jane Addams College of Social Work.