Kathleen graduated with a degree in journalism with an emphasis in photojournalism from the University of Georgia in 2000. After graduating, she moved to Chattanooga and worked as a staff photojournalist for the Times Free Press for seven years, winning numerous state and regional awards, as well as being nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2002.

For the last 17 years, she has focused her talent on freelance photography, shooting assignments locally, nationally, and internationally for a variety of clients and has been published around the world in a variety of places, including Time, People, Newsweek, Associated Press, Nature Conservancy, LensCulture, Photo District News, USAToday, Chattanooga Times Free Press, Next City, Chatter Magazine, Scenic City Weddings, The Tennessean, National Education Association, the Mountain Education Foundation, the Public Education Foundation, National Wildlife Federation, Gateway Journalism Review, NPR, South x Southeast Photomagazine, 100 Days in Appalachia, and National Geographic website. In 2017 Kathleen traveled to Guatemala for the BFB Foundation where she documented the lives and living conditions of those that the foundation supports. She continues to receive international recognition and awards for her work, including Julia Margaret Cameron Award, Worldwide Photo Gala, Photo District News, LensCulture, the National Wildlife Federation, Neutral Density Awards, The Atlanta Photojournalism Seminar, ReFocus Awards, and has been featured multiple times by the Nature Conservancy including a Judges' Pick award and twice had photos featured as National Geographic photo of the week. In the last several years she has been honored to have more than 50 photographs chosen for permanent display in three new hospitals — Erlanger East, Erlanger Behavioral Health, and the Kennedy Children's Outpatient Center in Chattanooga as well as various private collections. Kathleen has been a featured presenter at multiple Photo Night events, including Lee University, Association of Visual Arts in Chattanooga and University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. She is also a regular guest speaker for college-level photojournalism classes and hosted her first solo gallery show of her work from Guatemala in 2019. In 2021 she was named by NoogaToday as one of "17 Women Making History in Chattanooga" and named as a Marquis Who's Who in America. Kathleen continues to work on documentary projects including Mitchell Avenue, a Changing Chattanooga, and her mental health underwater portrait project "Depth of Light." Since March of 2024 she has been working on a project in collaboration with the Chattanooga Times Free Press and PBS FRONTLINE about rural hospital closures in Tennessee.

Follow her on instagram @kathleengreesonphoto