[5][6] Broadbent enrolled at University of California, Berkeley, where she was awarded the Horatio Stebbins scholarship as a junior and earned her Associate of Arts degree in anthropology (with honors) in 1951.
[2]: 190 From 1955 to 1960 she performed research among native peoples in Southern California and recorded Chukchansi, Ohlone, and Miwok.
[7][8] Her 1960 doctoral dissertation was A grammar of Southern Sierra Miwok, written under the advisement of Mary Haas.
[9] Broadbent began teaching at Northwestern University for Spring Semester 1961 followed by Barnard College that fall.
[11] Broadbent, a member of the Sierra Club, was party to a lawsuit against the Bureau of Land Management to restrict the use of vehicles in the California desert.