She was born totally blind, but had a surgery at the age of four that gave her a little vision back. A few months after that surgery, Sylvia was placed in a residential institutional school for the blind, where she stayed for three years. She was then enrolled at a private Catholic school with the children of doctors, lawyers, and politicians. In high school, she was told she should not study science. Now she holds a PhD in Environmental Science (Soil Chemistry) and is the Department Chair for the largest environmental science programs in the USA. Sylvia has lived in six countries and seven states, is fluent in Arabic, and has three amazing grown children.