Joana Castro Simonini earned her BA in history from the University of California, Berkeley, and her JD from the University of California, Hastings College of the Law. During law school, she worked as a fellow, clinical student, and later research assistant at the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at Hastings where she gained extensive experience in asylum law. After law school and prior to joining Canal Alliance, Joana was an intern at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in The Hague. Joana joined Canal Alliance in December 2014 as a staff attorney representing mainly recently arrived unaccompanied minors before the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) and United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in a variety of cases, including asylum and Special Immigrant Juvenile Status.