Psychology Graduate Students
- Title
- Graduate Student
- Division Social Sciences Division
- Department
- Psychology Department
- Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
- Writing Program
- Affiliations Transfer & Re-Entry Services, Teaching & Learning Center (TLC), Oakes College
- Phone (831) 459-1241
- Office Location
- Social Sciences 2, 201
- Office Hours By appointment; Social Sciences 2 Rm 201
- Mail Stop Psychology Faculty Services
- Courses Psyc 142: Oppression and Liberation , Psych 149: Community Psychology: Transforming Communities, Writ 2: Writing as Liberation- Our stories and language as rhetorical tools
Research Interests
Working with the Community Psychology Research and Action Team (CPRAT), Sylvane is developing a multi-method portfolio that addresses various educational equity struggles. Specifically, he focuses on participatory action research approaches to working with Latinx/Chicanx marginalized youth and young adults towards empowerment and radical healing.
Topics of research interest include recovering historical memory via social biography, sense of belonging and counterspaces in college, youth organizer requests for radical listening, epistemic justice in youth/adult interactions, and radical healing frameworks from Indigena-Chicana Feminism.
In the past, he has been a program evaluator and researcher for the Cultivamos Excelencia, S.E.M.I.L.L.A., and M.A.P.A. HSI initiatives.
Biography, Education and Training
Sylvane is a Chicano Ph.D. candidate in Social Psychology and Critical Race and Ethnic Studies where he is being trained as a community psychologist focusing on liberation and decolonial frameworks. Sylvane grew up and started his educational career on Kumeyaay Territory (aka San Diego, Ca) where he transfered from San Diego City/Mesa College. He also organized with SDCC Mecha, the Chicano Park Steering Committee, Peace and Dignity Journey, and the Izcalli Youth Leadership Camp. Outside of his scholarship and organizing, he is also an actor/performer with a Chicanx theater troupe: Teatro Izcalli.
Teaching Interests
Sylvane enjoys teaching courses that are Social Justice and student focused. For example, he has been the graduate student instructor for upper division Social Psychology courses like Psyc 149 Community Psychology and Psyc 142 Psychology of Oppression and Liberation. He has also been the GSI for a developmental pscyhology course Psyc 114: Human Development as a Cultural Process.
Outside of Psychology, Sylvane has designed and implemented a general education course in the Writing program: Writ 2: Rhetoric and Inquiry: Writing for Liberation.
Sylvane has taken these opportunities to utilize alternative grading approaches like narrative evaluation, self-assessment, and contract grading where he can better align his grading style with his critical pedagogy. He has also worked with the Teaching and Learning Center to develop a forthcoming resource guide on Ungrading practices for other curious instructors.
