Dr. Sylvia Sánchez Garza, a strong advocate for all students’ educational success, is a lifelong learner and is passionate about education. She believes students are born with a spark of creativity that at times needs to be reignited to remind them of their potential. She views learning as a continuous process, where leaders guide the learning and teaching relationship. A student’s daily life is their actual ongoing education. Therefore, one should embrace their culture, traditions, and diversity as essential aspects of that educational experience. She further believes that students have the power to make changes within themselves and within our society to make it an equal, fair, and diverse community. As an educational leader, she finds ways to reach out to the students in her community to fulfill the passion for learning.

Together with her husband, Richard, they own B.I.C. Development and Garco Ranch Communities, where she is Vice President of the company.  Additionally, she is now a gold star literary award-winning published author. Her book Cascarones has won several literary awards, including three gold star recognitions, and was recently distributed to over 4,200 Gear Up students during UTRGV’s Festiba event. As an author and poet, she speaks and presents at schools and events regarding literacy, reading, writing, and the importance of “sharing one’s story” because the world needs diversity. She does school visits, serves on literary panels, and has been a featured Gear Up keynote speaker at Edinburg and Brownsville’s UTRGV Fine Arts Auditoriums. During the pandemic, the author’s visits went virtual, and she was able to connect via zoom author panels, reaching audiences throughout the United States. This year several of her works were published in literary magazines, including one forthcoming this summer to be published by Penguin Teens. Sylvia has a poetry manuscript and a young adult novel that are forthcoming this year. Her author website is sylviasanchezgarza.com.

Sylvia has a Ph.D. in Leadership Studies from Our Lady of the Lake University’s School of Business and Leadership, a Masters in Educational Administration from Lamar University, and a Bachelor of Arts in English with a minor in Sociology from Pan American University. Also, she will complete an M.F.A. in Creative Writing this year from National University. As an educator, she has been:  a high school English teacher, a principal intern, has served on the South Texas I.S.D. School Board for fourteen years, the South Texas I.S.D. Foundation Board for seventeen years has been a former Discovery Elementary School Board member, where she served as President and a 4-H club manager. She is a graduate of the Leadership T.A.S.B. class of 2012 and has the distinction of a Master Trustee. Sylvia has been a community volunteer involved with multiple organizations. She is currently serving on the Museum of South Texas History board, where she is the Chair-Elect. She has served on the American Cancer Society’s steering committee and helped organize local Relay for Life events.  Also, her family has hosted three foreign exchange students.

She grew up in Weslaco, where the local library is named after her father, a former migrant farmworker, superintendent, mayor, and author. Her four sons all attended South Texas I.S.D. Her eldest son is a graduate from Columbia Law School, and her second son is a graduate of UTRGV’s School of Medicine first cohort. Her two youngest sons are on their paths to graduation. Together with her husband, Richard, two sons, and three dogs, she resides in Edinburg.