The Alliance for Young Artists & Writers is proud to announce its inaugural class of 2021 Alumni National Student Poets Program Micrograntees! Thanks to the support of The Maurice R. Robinson Fund and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, this year the Alliance was able to provide grants to six alumni of the National Student Poets Program (NSPP). The NSPP Alumni Microgrant Program supports creative projects by alumni of the National Student Poets Program, and is part of our Alumni Microgrant program; to read more about the ten 2021 Alumni Micrograntees, click here.
Judge Frank X. Walker selected NSPP alumni Daniel Blokh, Christian Butterfield, Michaela Coplen, Julie Dawkins, Taylor Fang, Miles Hewitt, Eileen Huang, Salma Mohammed, Maya Salameh, Alondra Uribe, and David Xiang to be grant recipients. Additional funds were also set aside for the NSPP Class of 2019 to continue the community service work they were unable to complete in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Congratulations to all our grantees! Read more about their inspiring project below!
Daniel Blokh
(2018 National Student Poet)
Imagined Winters | Birmingham, AL
Daniel Blokh is a 19-year-old Jewish-American writer based in Birmingham, AL. His parents hail from Russia and Ukraine. He was the 2018 National Student Poet representing the Southeast region and is the author of In Migration (BAM! Publishing 2016), Holding Myself Hostage in the Kitchen (Lit City Press 2017), and Grimmening (Diode Editions 2018). He attends Yale University.
With his microgrant, Daniel will complete his poetry manuscript, Imagined Winters. This work is an exploration of the historical trauma that has shaped today’s Jewish mentality and an attempt to reckon with the re-emergence of that trauma. Blokh grapples with these themes through his own family history: The manuscript begins in the pogroms of Eastern Europe, moves through the Soviet era and his parents’ immigration in the 1990s, and finally settles on his own mentality in the present as a result of this turbulent and re-emerging history.
Christian Butterfield
(2019 National Student Poet)
Illuminate | Bowling Green, KY
With his microgrant, Christian plans to facilitate a workshop series and publish a limited-run zine centered around the experience of queer youth.
Michaela Coplen
(2013 National Student Poet)
The Zoom Where It Happens: Virtual Negotiations and Global Governance | Oxford, United Kingdom
Michaela Coplen is a poet and doctoral researcher at the University of Oxford. Her academic research spans various topics in conflict and peacebuilding, focusing on U.S. foreign policy and international negotiations. Michaela has worked for the U.S. Army Peacekeeping and Stability Operations Institute, USAID, and the UK Cabinet Office, among others. Michaela has an MPhil in International Relations (with distinction) from the University of Oxford, and is a 2018 Marshall Scholar. With her microgrant, Michaela will pursue research related to her PhD course, examining the shifting field of virtual international negotiations amongst the Covid-19 pandemic. Writes Coplen: “Covid-19 has fundamentally altered international negotiation venues, technologies, and tactics. The consequences of these changes need to be examined. My goal is to do just that: Through embedded observation of virtual negotiations, interviews with key stakeholders and policymakers, and content analysis of participant statements, I will examine the development of virtual negotiation practices as well as their consequences for power dynamics in international relations.”
Taylor Fang
(2019 National Student Poet)
Inlet | Logan, UT
Taylor Fang is a 2020 graduate of Logan High School and served as the 2019 National Student Poet of the West. Her writing has been published in The New York Times, Pulitzer Center, and MIT Tech Review. She’s currently taking a gap year before attending Harvard University. In her free time, Taylor enjoys reading, hiking, and making zines.
With her microgrant, Taylor will build Inlet (inlet.space), a web app for people to create and share digital mood boards with poetry, writing, art, and music. Inlet’s goal is to help people feel better, share their favorite content with friends, and remind themselves of what they care about.
Miles Hewitt
(2012 National Student Poet)
The Myths—Heartfall | Brooklyn, NY
Miles Hewitt is a musician and poet. A 2012 National Student Poet, he graduated from Harvard College in 2018, where he received a cum laude BA in English. His poetry manuscript, The Candle Is Forever Learning to Sing, received several awards, including the Garrison Prize for best poem by an undergraduate. While at Harvard, his band The Solars toured extensively and released an EP, Retitled Remastered, to regional acclaim. Following a year attending to spiritual errands in western Massachusetts’ Pioneer Valley (his birthplace), he settled in Brooklyn, where he lives, teaches, and—under different global circumstances—performs.
With his microgrant, Miles will complete the recording of his 12-song debut album from his project, The Myths.
Eileen Huang
(2015 National Student Poet)
Alien/Exile | Holmdel, NJ
Eileen Huang is an English major at Yale University and a 2021 Bucknell Seminar for Undergraduate Poets Fellow. Her writing appears in Hyphen, The Adroit Journal, The Kenyon Review, NowThis, and more. Additionally, she has spoken on Asian-American issues to outlets such as the Associated Press, South China Morning Post, Voice of America, The New York Times, and the BBC, among others. She is the founder of The WeChat Project, a group of progressive Chinese Americans combating misinformation among the Chinese diaspora—an initiative that has been covered by Vox, SupChina, and more. She resides in New Jersey.
Eileen will use her microgrant to develop and publish her poetry chapbook Alien/Exile. Writes Huang: “Alien/Exile is a poetry chapbook exploring the historical and personal Asian-American experience. How did we go from “perpetual foreigners” to “model minorities”? How does Yellow Peril—the idea of Asians as “Others” posing existential threats to the West—manifest today? How do we reckon with our history as an “alien” group that has been legally, physically, and socially excluded from the dominating white American politic—all while still occupying land built upon enslaved Black labor, stolen from Indigenous people? Most significantly, what is the effect of all this heavy, untold history on the individual?”
Salma Mohammed
(2019 National Student Poet)
Deen Vogue | Fishers, IN
Salma Mohammad is an 18-year-old Palestinian-Egyptian Muslim American living in Fishers, IA. She was appointed the 2019 Scholastic National Student Poet of the Midwest after submitting her poem, “White Noise,” which recounted her mother’s struggle with Palestinian apartheid and exile from her home. Mohammad’s poetic works often revolve around the themes of social justice revolution, whether that takes the form of explaining the identity of the Arab-American “other” or of tracking the effects of colonialism, orientalism, and neocolonialism.
Salma will use her microgrant to fund the publication of Deen Vogue, a local-to-Indiana magazine dedicated to educating Muslims on social justice through art. Regarding Deen Vogue, Mohammed writes: “Social justice is a prominent theme of Islam. However, these themes are often neglected in practice. In the Muslim community of Fishers, IA, which is predominantly an Arab community, there are ideologies, such as racism and classism, that hinder the community’s ability to mobilize towards social justice values. Art can be used to create a space that creates challenging conversation around why our community is dormant in the social justice movement.”
Maya Salameh
(2016 National Student Poet)
HOW TO MAKE AN ALGORITH IN THE MICROWAVE | San Diego, CA
Maya Salameh is a poet studying at Stanford University, where she served as Inaugural Artist-in-Residence at the Markaz. She is a poet fellow of the William Male Foundation and Leonard Slade Endowment, as well as a 2016 National Student Poet, America’s highest honor for youth poets. Syrian by way of San Diego, she has performed her writing at venues including the Obama White House, Carnegie Hall, and her parents’ kitchen. Her poems have appeared in The Greensboro Review, Asian American Writer’s Workshop, and Burningword Literary Journal, among others. Maya is the author of rooh (Paper Nautilus Press 2020).
Maya will use her microgrant to develop and publish a collection of poems entitled How to Make an Algorith in the Microwave, which explores the divinity and digitization of the diasporic woman’s body, covering themes of surveillance, femininity, and how to pull a homily out of a computer.
Alondra Uribe
(2019 National Student Poet)
BX Poetry Potluck | Bronx, NY
Recent high-school graduate Alondra Uribe is exploring the world of young adulthood and surviving the aftermath of 2020. As an alumna of the National Students Poets Program and Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, she wishes to continue to be an ambassador for young people. Alondra has been given many platforms and opportunities, such as competing in Brave New Voices and performing at the Apollo Theater and Carnegie Hall, as well as traveling to Japan with former United States Ambassador Caroline Kennedy as a cultural exchange student. With a new year ahead, she is ready to expand her talents and see what the world has in store for her.
With last year’s pandemic changing the course of everyone’s life, the BX Poetry Potluck hopes to show that poetry can be an anchor. Along with Alondra and other NSPP alumni, students will work with guests from Arizona Youth Poet Laureates to discuss, write, and revise prompt-based work related to the DreamYard Center’s collaborative booklet “Los Milagros.”
The only requirement for the class is to bring a poem or two! In many cultures, in order to have a seat at the dinner table to eat, one must first bring a dish to contribute to the feast. During National Poetry Month, the BX Poetry Potluck encourages genuine participation and contribution to all the spaces we occupy. Using poetry as the feast, we all bring something to the table.
David Xiang
(2015 National Student Poet)
Hope Storytelling Project | Saint Louis, MO
David Xiang is a poet currently studying at Harvard Medical School. At Harvard College, he studied under Jorie Graham and Josh Bell, and graduated magna cum laude with a major in History and Science. His work has been published in Cream City Review, The Harvard Advocate, Magma Poetry, Cordite Poetry Review, Roadrunner Review, and Rappahannock Review, among others. David was awarded the 2019 Lloyd McKim Garrison Prize in Poetry, awarded to a Harvard undergraduate for the best poem, and nominated for the 2019 Best of the Net Anthology. He hopes to become a physician-writer and seeks to bridge medicine and the humanities through his writing, teaching, and community service.
With his microgrant, David will continue the work of the Hope Storytelling Project, which uses poetry as a vehicle for connection, growth, and healing. This year, Hope Storytelling Project plans to partner with caregiver programs at Massachusetts General Hospital to teach caregivers, patients, and clinicians how to utilize poetry and storytelling for healthcare, specifically for coping with loneliness, grief, loss, and end-of-life. They also plan to partner with hospice programs, nursing homes, and hospital support/mental health services to engage with community members who are suffering from isolation and uncertainty.
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