Alli received her J.D. with high honors from Drake University Law School with a certificate in Food and Agricultural Law in May 2011. She graduated summa cum laude from California Lutheran University in 2006 with a B.A. in Interdisciplinary Studies with a focus on Pre-Naturopathic Medicine. After graduating from CLU, Alli moved to Mexico City for a year to work with migrants and refugees at a non-profit, Sin Fronteras. While there, Alli conducted an informal study about the food security among the migrants and refugees with the hopes of increasing funding for food from the United Nations High Commission on Refugees. Upon returning from Mexico, Alli worked at Trader Joe's and with the S'Cool Food Initiative, a non-profit working to get healthy lunches into the public schools in Santa Barbara County. In January 2011, Alli won the University of Oregon Journal of Environmental Law and Litigation's writing competition with a paper titled, "And on that Farm There Was an Intern, E-I-E-I-O: Labor Issues in Training a New Generation of Farmers." In the fall of 2010, Alli presented her research about farm internships and labor law at the American Agricultural Law Association's annual conference in Omaha, Nebraska. While in law school, Alli was actively involved with the Drake Agricultural Law Association, serving as vice-president her second year and president her last year of school, and served as Treasurer of the Health Law Association. She served as Junior Staff on the Drake Law Review from 2009-2010. Alli is currently pursuing her LL.M. in Agricultural and Food Law at the University of Arkansas. She was chosen as the 2011-2012 recipient of the Marler Clark Graduate Assistantship, a partnership that will allow her to research and write for Food Safety News.