Sydney received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology from SUNY Geneseo in 2019 and received a Master’s in Psychology from New York University in 2021. She joined the HDFS program in 2021 to work with Dr. Alaina Brenick to examine youth victimization and discrimination experiences in various contexts. Sydney is also interested in how media contributes to the development of stereotyping and discrimination, as well as how we can use media to combat the development of harmful and prejudicial beliefs toward various social groups.

At SUNY Geneseo, Sydney worked in a social cognition lab, examining explicit and implicit bias toward individuals with tattoos in hiring decisions, presenting this research at the 2019 Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) Conference in Portland, Oregon. Sydney then developed her own individual project that combined her love of dance and social psychology. Experiences within the dance community led her to identify prominent stereotypes and discrimination in dance, and further motivated her to investigate the psychological bases for these biases. Sydney went on to present this work both at the 2020 SPSP conference and at NYU’s MA research conference, winning 3rd place in the poster competition. Sydney also worked as a lab manager and teaching assistant at Geneseo.

When Sydney arrived at NYU, she became curious about the origins of prejudice and discrimination toward social groups and joined the Conceptual Development and Social Cognition (CDSC) lab at NYU. For her master’s thesis, she performed a content analysis of the quality and quantity of racial representation, stereotypes, and status depictions in popular children’s media, and how children’s media consumption predicted their racial biases overtime. Sydney received NYU’s Model-Mentorship Grant in 2020 to conduct this research. In 2021, Sydney presented this work at the SPSP Annual Conference, and NYU’s MA research conference where she won 2nd place in the poster competition.

Looking ahead, Sydney is excited to join the HDFS family at UConn and begin participating in research that centers on taking an interdisciplinary and developmental approach!

Gradate student Rachael Farina was accepted as a mentor to the NCFR Mentoring Academy

Graduate student Michelle Miller was selected by the Ford Foundation and TCC Group for a graduate fellowship through the American Evaluation Association GEDI Program. Through the fellowship program, Michelle will learn and build upon her evaluation programming skills. Congratulations, Michelle!

Congratulations to undergraduate HDFS major Rupa Sharmin ’23, UConn Stamford student, who was awarded a Gilman International Scholarship,  “congressionally funded through the Bureau of Education and Cultural Affairs at the State Department. The funding supports broadening the student population who participates in study abroad, encourages travel to diverse locations around the globe, intensive language study and internship experiences.” “With family from Bangladesh and a native of Stamford, she is an aspiring international pilot, seeking cross-cultural competency through the exchange opportunity. Sharmin is embarking on a career field in which fewer than 10 percent are women, and plans to use this position to explore the many cultures of the world, with attention to language study and cross cultural communication through immersion. Sharmin will apply to Yonsei University in South Korea for the spring 2022 semester and, upon her return, will reach out to SSS students to promote the Gilman scholarship and EGL program opportunities.” Learn more here: https://today.uconn.edu/2021/06/uconn-scholars-earn-gilman-and-cls-scholarships/

Congratulations to  graduate student Samantha Lawrence, recipient of the UConn CLAS Christine N. Witzel Scholarship, for “an academically promising…student…undertaking a research project related to women’s health”!

Congratulations to graduate student Debra Tomasino, who will be working on a multi-site study (Yale, Emory, and Northwestern) over the next year as a gerontology researcher on a project focused on improving Emergency Medicine for geriatric patients.

This summer, Graduate Student Kaleigh Ligus will be the Greg O’Neil Student Policy Intern for the Gerontological Society of America. During this time, she will be immersed in aging-related policy development and participate in this process at the national level.

Six HDFS undergraduate students were selected to join the 2021-2022 CLAS Women’s Leadership Collective: Makayla R Dawkins, Zarya B Hernandez Salto, Sierra R Jennings, Blessing Johnson, Bonnie Jurgensmier, and Maya S Reddy. The Collective provides undergraduate students with a unique leadership learning experience coupled with group mentorship from UConn alumnae. Congratulations to all of these students!