Activism cultivated at SF State fuels alum’s advocacy efforts

Carolyn Sideco gives a talk at a May 2024 Kinesiology Alumni Dinner at San Francisco State University.

Carolyn Sideco (B.S., ’03) is no stranger to community advocacy. It’s something she learned as a Kinesiology student at San Francisco State University and later put into practice in her 20-plus-year career as a physical education teacher and athletic director at ICA Cristo Rey Academy in the Mission District and most recently as a coaching consultant. The health of her community is always top of mind. So when the opportunity arose to take part in the recent Netflix docuseries “You Are What You Eat: A Twin Experiment,” she was all in.

The Netflix show was based on a Stanford University clinical trial that followed 21 sets of genetically identical twins who changed their diets and lifestyles for eight weeks to discover how certain foods impact the body. One twin followed an omnivorous diet, the other ate vegan. (No spoilers on which diet earned better marks.) The streaming series focused on four sets of twins, including Carolyn Sideco and her sister Rosalyn.

The production company and Netflix had the ultimate say in the finished product, but Sideco wanted to put her messages out there. “I had a plan. Every time I was on camera I talked about social justice, food justice, Filipinos who are vegan and the cultural movements I’m part of and how it relates to food,” she said. “I knew from the very beginning that my role was to bring amplification to public health workers who were helping people improve the quality of their lives through their diet.”

Sideco credits San Francisco State as the place where her views about health, fitness and community activism coalesced. She took an unconventional path to earning her degree and teaching credential, and that made the experience meaningful, she says.

After a childhood spent playing various sports, Sideco decided to pursue a Journalism degree at SF State. She wanted to become ESPN’s first female sportscaster. Getting pregnant in her third semester caused her to pause her studies. Twelve years later she returned to SF State as a single mother with part-time jobs as a coach, referee and gym director. Sports was still on her mind, only this time she wanted to become a physical education teacher. But she wondered if she could pull it off while working and parenting on her own.

“San Francisco State said, ‘Hey, we still value you. You’re a single parent, you’ve got three part-time jobs and you want to be a kick ass student? We got you.’ And they did,” she said. “That’s what exposed me to this idea that sports can be expansive, just like how I thought San Francisco State represented that expansiveness of what I thought academia was.”

“San Francisco State said, ‘Hey, we still value you. You’re a single parent, you’ve got three part-time jobs and you want to be a kick ass student? We got you.’ And they did,” she said.

Sideco carried that mindset to the field as a coach, athletic director and in her current role as the owner of her own consulting company, Coaching Kapwa (@coachingkapwa), where she provides professional development to coaches and athletic directors.

“The profession wants [coaches and administrators] to only think about wins or losses or developing elite programs. I think our profession has the capacity to be expansive,” she said. “I tend to the other aspects of the sports ecosystem that contribute to positive growth, social development and cultural deepening.”

Sideco sought out community her whole life. She found it in sports starting at the age of nine on the volleyball court. She discovered another community at SF State. In May, Sideco got a chance to thank the department that gave her so much when she was the keynote speaker at the Kinesiology Alumni Dinner.

“I was supported in community, and that became my community — the people there, my cohort, my colleagues and even the faculty and staff. That’s why I’m so involved and invested in the alumni program, because I take that as my responsibility to my community,” she said. “San Francisco State, its teachers and its school — that’s the handbook of how I want to live my life.”

Interested in a career in athletics? Learn more about SF State’s Kinesiology program.