About me
Seventeen-year-old Isabel Shen, 2026 Oakland Vice Youth Poet Laureate, is a junior at Head Royce. She is an Oakland poet, oral history advocate, and the daughter of a Hong Kong immigrant. Through her poetry, she aims to amplify the voices of Oakland’s rich and diverse immigrant community and to change the way their stories are told in a time of conflict and crisis. She hopes to expand and complexify their stories and fight for their rights by intentionally depicting the nuance and tenderness that is integral to the diasporic experience—the loss, sense of community, perseverance, fierceness, love, and more—and show immigrants as not just numbers or headlines but as humans in every way. Her poetry connects to her fascination with oral histories, which has taught her the power of communities being able to tell their story and how listening to people's experiences is essential to growing relationships and personhood. She hopes her poetry can inspire diasporic youth and communities within Oakland to express their stories while staying true to themselves and to build community with other Oaklanders. Isabel is also a 2025 OYPL Finalist.
