Vera Institute of Justice

Becca DiBennardo is a senior research associate with Vera’s Ending Girls’ Incarceration (EGI) initiative. Becca leads research, data collection, and analysis for EGI’s California Action Network, partnering with government and community leaders to trial policy and practice changes to end the incarceration of girls and gender-expansive youth, and to advance gender justice and equity. Becca previously worked with Vera’s Center on Immigration and Justice, leading mixed methods research supporting universal legal representation for migrant children.

Becca’s dissertation examined how intersections between law, popular opinion, and medicine have shifted the regulation of sexual violence over time. She has also researched discrimination against children with LGBTQ parents, Medicaid policies’ impact on contraceptive access, and the health of juveniles in detention.

Becca holds a BA from Vassar College, an MPA from New York University’s Wagner Graduate School of Public Service, and a PhD in sociology from the University of California, Los Angeles.