Laura “Joanna” Beck Wilkinson is an attorney based in St. Louis, Missouri, with a BA in Economics from Loyola University Chicago and a JD from the University of Minnesota. She has extensive experience in adoption and assisted reproduction law, having worked with firms in San Francisco and Indianapolis before joining Professor Mary Beck’s practice in 2008.

Joanna is a frequent guest lecturer at Washington University and the University of Missouri law schools and has spoken nationally and internationally on topics such as pre-embryo practice and same-sex family building. She co-authored a Brief of Amicus Curiae cited in a 2022 U.S. Supreme Court majority opinion and authored the Missouri Bar Manual on parentage in 2024.

Licensed in Missouri, Illinois, Arkansas, Kansas, and the U.S. Supreme Court, Joanna is a Fellow of the Academy of Adoption & Assisted Reproduction Attorneys and a member of the ABA’s Family Law Section on ART. Joana is also a member of ASRM.

Outside of work, Joanna enjoys jogging in Forest Park, cheering on the St. Louis Cardinals, restoring her family’s 1904 World’s Fair home, collecting obscure French fashion, and playing Uno with her husband, four sons, and English setter puppy.