Jill Levenson

Jill S. Levenson is an American social worker and professor of social work at Barry University, known for her research into "the way society monitors and treats sexual criminals." She has been a co-investigator or consultant on five grants funded by the U.S. Department of Justice, researching the impact and effectiveness of social policies and therapeutic interventions designed to reduce sexual violence. Most recently, her ground-breaking research has focused on the prevalence and impact of adverse childhood experiences and their relationship to adult psychosocial problems and criminality. She has published over 100 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters, many of which have been about adverse childhood experiences and the implications for trauma-informed care.

She is frequently invited to present at various state, local, and national conferences as a keynote speaker about trauma-informed care in clinical, correctional, and forensic settings. In 2016 she was invited to present in Florida, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Idaho, Michigan, and New Zealand, to provide TIC training for clinical and forensic practitioners.

Levenson received her BA in sociology from the University of Pittsburgh in 1985, her MSW in clinical social work from the University of Maryland, Baltimore in 1987, and her PhD in social welfare from Florida International University in 2003. In 2004, she joined the faculty of Lynn University's College of Arts and Sciences, where she remained until joining Barry in 2014.

Levenson has criticized sex offender registries for what she claims is their ineffectiveness, telling NPR in 2015 that "The consensus of that [policy] research does not point in the direction of registries reducing sexual crimes or sexual recidivism." She has expressed similar views about laws restricting where sex offenders can legally live, acknowledging that these laws are well-intended but saying that "they don't really address the most common types of situations children are abused in," because "Children are much more likely to be sexually abused by someone they know and trust." She has also been critical of the use of GPSs to monitor sex offenders, because, according to her, the technology is used too sweepingly and its capabilities are overestimated.