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Sergio A. Gonzalez

Assistant Professor

School Ombudsperson

Educational Foundations, Organizations, and Policy

Sergio A. Gonzalez (él/he/him), Ph.D., is a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Higher Education specializing in Critical Qualitative Methods in the Department of Educational Foundations, Organizations, and Policy (EFOP) at the University of Pittsburgh. He is also an affiliate faculty member in the Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies Program and the Cultural Studies Program, serves as the School of Education Ombudsperson, and co-coordinates the EFOP Ph.D. program.

His research has three intersecting commitments: (1) understanding the lived experiences of historically marginalized individuals, particularly QTPOC communities, such as Queer and Trans (QT) Latine/x in educational settings; (2) examining the role of Jotería Microaffirmations in higher education scholarship; and (3) engaging with co-creators to make meaning of Queer of Color theorizing, such as Jotería Pedagogy, through critical qualitative approaches like pláticas/queer pláticas and counter-storytelling. His interdisciplinary research draws on Women of Color feminisms, including Black and Queer feminist ideologies, Chicana/Latina feminisms, and Jotería Studies.

Dr. Gonzalez’s scholarship appears in the International Journal of Qualitative Studies in Education, Qualitative Research, the Journal of Diversity in Higher Education, and the Journal of Queer and Trans Studies in Education. He also co-edited Queering Higher Education: The QTPOC Experience (Cognella, 2022). His co-authored article “Three Card Spread” received the 2025 Virginia Commonwealth University Publishing Award for Outstanding Journal Article. His scholarship and leadership have been honored by ACPA, NASPA, ASHE, and the University of Pittsburgh, including the ACPA Coalition for Sexuality and Gender Identities (CSGI) Dr. D-L Stewart Research Award and Pitt’s 2025 Faculty Champion Award. He serves on the editorial board of the Journal of College Student Development and on the national board of the Association for Jotería Arts, Activism, and Scholarship.

Dr. Gonzalez received his Ph.D. in Higher Education and Student Affairs and an M.A. in Applied Gender Studies from Claremont Graduate University (CGU). He also holds an M.Ed. in Postsecondary Administration and Student Affairs from the University of Southern California (USC) and a B.A. in Communication Studies from Manhattanville College.

Before joining Pitt in 2024, he was an assistant professor at Duquesne University, where he directed the Equity Education Certificate Program, and a visiting professor of Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Scripps College. His path to the professoriate began in college access and student affairs, including work with College Track and the LGBTQ+ resource centers at USC and the Claremont Colleges.

A first-generation academic and the first in his family to graduate from high school, Dr. Gonzalez carries those experiences into how he shows up in community and navigates academia. He is an hijo to his Madre y Padre and a brother, Tío, Madrina, Nino, and Nieto to his chosen family and family.

Dr. Gonzalez teaches graduate courses on social justice, identity, and student affairs practice in higher education. At Pitt, these include Social Justice in Higher Education, Contemporary Issues in Racialization, Culture, and Identity, Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies in Higher Education, and Higher Education Administration.

Dr. Gonzalez’s research examines the lived experiences of queer and trans people of color (QTPOC), particularly queer and trans Latinx students, faculty, and administrators, across the higher education pipeline. His key areas include:

  • Jotería studies in higher education: identity, belonging, and community among queer and trans Latinx undergraduate and graduate students. This includes students at predominantly white institutions and Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) such as Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs).
  • Jotería Pedagogy and Jotería Microaffirmations: frameworks for how educators and institutions can affirm QTPOC students, and JoteríaCrit as an approach to resistance studies in education.
  • Critical qualitative methodologies: pláticas and queer pláticas, counter-storytelling, photo journaling, chisme as method, divination dialogues, and jotería intuition as embodied inquiry. In all of these, participants are co-creators of knowledge.
  • Faculty experiences and futurity: how queer, trans, and faculty of color navigate the tenure track, academic time, and institutional climates shaped by anti-DEI policy.
  • Emerging work: neurodivergence among queer and trans Latinx faculty, and uncompensated labor among students and non-tenure-track educators.

  • Outstanding Journal Article, Virginia Commonwealth University Publishing Award (2025)
  • Faculty Champion Award, K. Leroy Irvis Black History Month Celebration, University of Pittsburgh (2025)
  • Dissertation of the Year Award, Honorable Distinction, Queer Studies SIG, AERA (2025)
  • Outstanding Reviewer, Association for the Study of Higher Education (ASHE) (2025)
  • Latinx Inclusion Award, Latinx/a/o Knowledge Community, NASPA, with the QT Latinx Collective (2025)
  • Exemplary Program Award, Gender and Sexuality Knowledge Community, NASPA, with the QT Latinx Collective (2025)
  • Faculty Fellow, American Association of Hispanics in Higher Education (AAHHE) (2025–2026)
  • Emerging Faculty Leader Academy Faculty Fellow, Cohort IX, NASPA (2024–2025)
  • Dr. D-L Stewart Research Award, Coalition for Sexuality and Gender Identities (CSGI), ACPA (2023)
  • Rising Graduate Scholar, Diverse: Issues in Higher Education (now The EDU Ledger) (2023)
  • Outstanding Doctoral Student Award, Latinx/a/o Knowledge Community, NASPA (2023)
  • Latinx Inclusion Award and Intersectional Inclusion Award, NASPA (2022)

  • Editorial Board Member, Journal of College Student Development
  • Ad Hoc Reviewer, Review of Research in Education
  • Awards Committee Co-Chair, Critical Race Studies in Education Association
  • National Board Member and Scholarship Liaison, Association for Jotería Arts, Activism, and Scholarship
  • Local and Community Engagement Committee (LCEC), ASHE
  • IRB Review Board, Interfaith Voices for Reproductive Justice
  • Editorial Board Member, Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice
  • Associate Editor, Journal of Queer and Trans Studies in Education (2023–2026)
  • Secretary/Treasurer, Queer Research Issues SIG, AERA (2023–2025)
  • Council on Ethnic Participation Mentor-Protégé Program, ASHE
    • Co-Chair (2023–2025)
    • Planning Committee (2023–present)
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