2024 STars hall of fame

Alexandra Huynh

5th National Youth Poet Laureate of the United States

Del Paso Manor \ Winston Churchill Middle School \ Mira Loma High School ‘20

Alexandra Huynh is a Vietnamese American poet. In 2021, she was appointed the 5th National Youth Poet Laureate of the United States by Urban Word NYC. She is the first Southeast Asian individual to hold this title.

Born and raised in Sacramento, Alexandra owes her success to her compassionate family and vibrant community. Alexandra began writing poetry at age 7, but gained the courage to begin sharing her work at age 16 through poetry slams hosted by Sacramento Area Youth Speaks (SAYS). The SAYS program allowed Alexandra to develop her poetic and political voice, and she credits her mentors at SAYS for nurturing her into the poet she is today.

Alexandra has been invited to perform at venues across the nation and internationally, including the National Mall in Washington, D.C. and UNESCO Headquarters in Paris. Her work has been featured by NPR, NBC, CBS This Morning, PBS, and The Washington Post. In 2022, Alexandra was featured in the award-winning children’s book, Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls: 100 Inspiring Young Changemakers. Later that year, she joined the international literacy nonprofit Room to Read as a member of the Book Creator Collective. In 2023, Alexandra became the inaugural artist-in-residence at the Harvard University Asia Center. And in 2025, Alexandra will complete a writers’ residency with the Diasporic Vietnamese Artists Network in Hue, Vietnam.

Alexandra is a proud alum of SJUSD schools. She attends Stanford University, where she will graduate with a degree in American Studies in 2025. Outside of poetry, she is committed to issues of prison abolition, climate resilience, and liberatory education.