Karina Chavarria’s research takes an interdisciplinary approach, incorporating frameworks from Sociology, Education, and Ethnic Studies to examine the relationship between structured inequities and youth’s agency in enacting transformative social change. In particular, she focuses on the ways marginalized youth across race/ethnicity and immigration status are impacted and their resistance through advocacy for self and community. This work is guided by her commitment to working with Chicanx/Latinx youth and undergraduate students of color within and outside of the classroom foregrounding the connections between community ways of knowing and academic knowledge to analyze social inequalities and identify avenues for addressing processes that reproduce inequity in our society. In support of her work, she has been awarded fellowships from the NAEd Spencer Foundation and the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin.

Her postsecondary education began at the community college (San Jose City College) as a consequence of being undocumented at the time with non-existent financial aid for undocumented students. After three years, she transferred to her dream school at UC Berkeley where she completed a BA in Sociology and English. She then completed an MA in Social Science at University of Chicago and Ph.D. in Sociology at UCLA.

Karina Chavarria was born in Guadalajara, Mexico, brought to the U.S. at the age of 9 and grew up in San Jose, CA. She is the granddaughter and daughter of immigrant farmworkers and deeply appreciative of their sacrifices. Their hard work fuels her commitment to realizing the transformative power of education beyond just a college degree.