Lavanda-Sofia (Lava) Probasco
Session 3
Title: Intersecting Identities: Lived Experience Community Panel
Ph.D. student in speech, language, and hearing sciences, UMass Amherst
Pronouns: They/she
Lavanda-Sofía was born and raised rurally in the border community of Juarez Mexico and El Paso, Texas. They are finishing up the MA SLP program as well as in the second year of their doctoral studies in the Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences department at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. They are interested in gaining a better understanding of language development, especially in the intersection of bilingualism and autism, and love to participate in their community by leading Club Convivencia, a Spanish language conversation club, and by contributing to research as well as supporting bilingual families as part of The Bilingual Language Development Lab under the mentorship of Dr. Megan Gross. Lava also loves singing with the Queer Joy Chorus. In previous seasons of life they have owned a small business, taught music in a school, and fought for changes in military family housing as part of a nonprofit called Hope on the Homefront. As a neurodivergent and physically disabled researcher, multimedia artist, and parent to two autistic children, Lava is passionate about disability rights and advocacy from an intersectional and human rights perspective. Their goal is to help narrow the interneurotype communication gap and strive towards a more accessible world where each person’s human dignity is valued and protected for who they are and how their presence enriches the community, not for what they can produce.