Departmental Racialized Students Group

Zein Abuosbeh (she/her) – APHD SA Equity and Diversity Officer

Zein is a third-year PhD student in the Developmental Psychology and Education Program. Her doctoral research focuses on the relationship between oral language skills and reading comprehension among French Immersion students. As a native speaker of Arabic, Zein is also interested in the Arabic language development of Syrian refugee children resettled in Canada.    Zein is this year’s Equity, Diversity and Inclusion officer. Her goal in this position is to provide a safe space for APHD students to express themselves and any concerns they may have.

Ask me about … the DPE program, where to get started in academia, work-life balance, books, best spots around campus and being Palestinian-Canadian.

Angelie Ignacio (she/her)

Angelie Ignacio is a third-year PhD student in Developmental Psychology and Education program under the supervision of Dr. Eunice Jang. Her research interests are dynamic assessment of reading and writing, using technology in assessment, teaching, and learning contexts, and using mixed methods research. 

Ask me about…first-generation graduate student, role-playing video games, fantasy and romance books, being Filipino-Canadian, mixed methods research.

Calpanaa Jegatheeswaran (she/her)

Calpanaa Jegatheeswaran is a doctoral student in the Developmental Psychology and Education program at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE). She studies how environmental risk factors and quality of parenting impact children's development during their formative years under the supervision of Dr. Michal Perlman.

Ask me about … Being Tamil-Canadian, dealing with intergenerational trauma, mental health struggles as a graduate student, work-life balance, and South Asian Art and Culture (including Bharatanatyam, Veena, and Carnatic music).

Krystina Raymond (she/her)

Krystina Raymond is in her final year of the PhD in Developmental Psychology and Education under the supervision of Dr. Becky Xi Chen. Her doctoral research focuses on the development of language and literacy skills in bilingual speaking children, and their contributions to reading. Krystina is devoted to issues supporting bi/multilingual education and is passionate about helping students particularly through the lenses of antiracism, equity, diversity, and inclusion. She also is a course instructor at the Graduate Centre for Academic Communication at UofT, where she strives to create interactive and inclusive learning experiences that encourage active and respectful participation.

Ask me about…bi/multilingual language and literacy research, Montréal, being Guyanese/ Québecoise, navigating academia with an EDI lens, joining the PhD DPE program as an out-of-province student, and joining APHD department committees.

Jenny Hui (she/her)

Jenny is a third-year PhD student in the Counselling and Clinical Psychology program, supervised by Dr. Roy Moodley. She is passionate about the thriving and resilience of people with intersecting identities and experiences, including racialized, 2SLGBTQIA+, and disabled and chronically ill people. Her master’s thesis explored the lived experiences of bisexual East Asian young adults in Canada. Ultimately, Jenny’s scholarship and clinical practice strive to uplift the stories of people and communities who are under-represented in counselling and psychology.

Ask me about… APHD’s Counselling and Clinical Psychology program, reading and books (especially fiction and memoirs by and about 2SLGBTQIA+ BIPOC), creative writing, dogs, K-dramas, living in Vancouver, being a UofT undergrad or graduate student  

Rya Buckley (she/her)

Rya is a first-year PhD student in the School and Clinical Child Psychology program, under the supervision of Dr. Chloe Hamza. She is broadly interested in school and postsecondary mental health, especially the experiences of marginalized students. Her master’s thesis work focused on the experiences of racialized university students accessing wellness and mental health supports on campus.

Ask me about…the MA in School and Clinical Child Psychology (SCCP), finding community as a Black graduate student, and student mental health research.

Vashti Kamassah (she/her)

Vashti is a first-year PhD student in Developmental Psychology and Education under the supervision of Linda Iwenofu. Vashti is interested in alternative approaches to “traditional” education and how marginalized identities shape the lives of school-aged children and adolescents (school belonging, resilience, coping strategies, etc.). She is a graduate assistant in the Department of Social Justice Education (SJE) and a research assistant at the University of Toronto Mississauga, where she studies learning math using music.

Ask me about… music, mental health, Black mental health, research work in graduate school, and navigating accessibility services.

Paul Douglas II (he/him)

Paul Douglas II is a second-year international student in the M.Ed. Developmental Psychology & Education program. He serves as a Research Assistant in the Power in Youth Lab, exploring how exposure to racial discrimination in childhood is related to negative health outcomes later in life, under the supervision of Dr. Linda Iwenofu, PhD, C. Psych. He is also an Inclusive Excellence Scholar and Junior Fellow at Massey College.

Paul's research interests center on anti-Black racism (ABR) and the promotion of racial equity and inclusivity within clinical and school psychology programs. He believes that increasing racial diversity and inclusivity in clinical psychology programs can improve mental and physical outcomes for all individuals. By diversifying researchers and sample populations, we can enhance the generalizability of various evaluations, assessments, and forms of psychotherapy. Notably, Black licensed clinical psychologists represent approximately 4% of the profession in the U.S. and only 1% in Canada, with Black men constituting merely a fraction of 1% in both countries.

Feel free to ask me about forming resilience, taking calculated risks, finding community in university, and navigating academia as a person of African descent.

Hunter Meng-Hsun Lee (he/him)

Hunter Lee is a fifth-year PhD student in the Developmental Psychology and Education program under the supervision of Dr. Eunice Jang. His research interests are psychometrics, the effect of technology on language testing and assessment, and second language reading development.

Ask me about…good food around Toronto, traveling and networking while attending conferences, being a Taiwanese international student at OISE, and studying and working as an international student in Canada.