Alumni Profile: Svati Balaji 

By Elaine Smith

When her father accepted a technology job in the United States, Svati Balaji moved with her family from India to California to finish her high school career and looked toward attending university in North America.

“I was looking at schools in the U.S. and Canada,” Balaji said. “York was one of my top choices. Since coming here, I have fallen in love with the city and the campus and have had lots of opportunities to get involved.

“I really came to York not knowing what I wanted and now, I feel prepared for the next number of years.”

For the next few years, certainly, Balaji hopes to be ensconced in a residence/student life position at a Canadian university, something she discovered as an option during her undergraduate career working at a residence office and then as a residence don.

“I like helping students find their way and helping people is a value I grew up with, especially as the oldest sibling,” Balaji said. “It translated to a professional role. Working with students, and especially international students, warms my heart, since I can relate. I like helping smooth their transition to university.”

Ideally, Balaji would like to work for a few years before returning to university for a master’s degree, either in science education, viewing it through an equity, diversity and inclusion lens, or in student affairs.

“It’s yet to be determined,” she said.

Balaji understands the challenges that international students face and is passionate about helping them. Although her family was in California when she began studying at York and later moved to British Columbia, she couldn’t visit them once the pandemic hit and travel was restricted. York International assisted her throughout with any immigration questions that arose, but she largely relied on her friends for comfort.

“My friends were a big support system,” she said. “They are my chosen family after going through four years together. I was also lucky that my best friend is a first-generation Canadian and offered to be my second family. I had an open invitation to dinner and for winter breaks.”

In her science studies, Balaji focused on science education and pedagogy, rather than a career in medicine or a laboratory. She was in the first class permitted to undertake collaborative theses; she and classmate Jacquelina DaSilva were the first pair to pursue a science education question. Using surveys and focus groups, they pinpointed where changes needed to be made in a genetics course to support learning and to counter common but inaccurate genetic essentialist thinking processes. The pair presented their findings at York’s Teaching in Focus conference, Western University’s science education conference and Dalhousie University’s teachers’ conference.

“We came up with our own question, and it was very cool to be invited to present our findings,” Balaji said.

She has also worked as a researcher for Professor Tamara Kelly, the Faculty of Science’s Pedagogical Innovation Chair in Science Education. Recently, she will be working on collaborative research projects with University of Toronto Scarborough educators to determine what a sense of belonging looks like in STEM classes. She has also been involved in collaborations with other universities through the Canadian Consortium of Science Education Scholars.

“I am very grateful to Professor Kelly,” she said. “She helped me put into perspective what I might want to do with my life.”

For three years, Balaji also served as a President’s Ambassador, one of a group of York student leaders who met with York President Rhonda Lenton and other administrators to provide student input on a variety of issues. This past year, Balaji worked in the president’s office as a special project assistant, organizing the President’s Ambassadors program.

“It was an action-packed year,” said Balaji, whose duties also included recruiting volunteers for Congress 2023 on campus. “Working with students blends all of my interest together; my studies and co-curricular activities informed each other and combining both worlds is cool.”