Jenn Strub to connect young people with poetry as Nanaimo’s new Youth Poet Laureate
Strub (pictured) said it was her childhood psychologist who inspired her to go into psychology so she can be that person for other children who go through similar experiences. (Lauryn Mackenzie/CHLY 101.7fm)
Growing up, poetry was not something Jenn Strub connected with very much. But after figuring out how poetry could be a tool to express herself, she now wants to help other youth find the same connection.
Taking over the role from Paige Pierce, Strub is the City of Nanaimo’s newest youth poet laureate. Starting her two-year term this month, Strub will work to connect youth in the community with poetry and raise awareness of the positive impacts the literary arts can have.
Strub spoke with CHLY as she set out to start in her new role.
Strub said she wasn’t much of a writer or a reader growing up, finding it difficult to finish a book or novel study in high school. As the COVID-19 pandemic slowed things down for everyone, Sturb said she discovered the book series After by Anna Todd, which helped her fall in love with reading
“Then I continued to do online courses, online school, through COVID, and I found all of my written responses to homework being more ‘existential,’ if you will,” Strub said. “So I just started writing in my free time, and poetry didn't come till much later, but writing was definitely there. Reading was definitely there.”
Soon, Strub turned her psychology major into a psychology and creative writing double major, which she is now in her third year of.
In her studies, she learned new writing techniques and how she can use poetry as a new way to express herself.
“Sometimes it's really difficult to put a feeling into words that make sense to someone else, or like a lesson, something learned, whereas poetry, you can do whatever you want. Sometimes there are no rules,” she said. “I really like writing in free verse for that reason. It definitely gets everything that I'm feeling out onto the page without rules or stipulations.”
Growing up as a child faced with many challenges as her parents went through a messy divorce, Strub said it was her childhood psychologist who inspired her to go into psychology so she can be that person for other children who go through similar experiences.
“Then I watched as Paige [Pierce], the youth poet laureate before me, had this effect on people and how inspired they were by her,” she said. “I kind of wanted to take that same thing that I was manifesting into psychology and put it into the same pursuits like poetry, creative writing, and do the same. Then I was going through the application process and filling out my application, and I had so many ideas for things to do, and I was like, ‘Yeah, I want to do this.’”
With her newfound passion for writing and poetry, Stub was encouraged by her friends to apply for the role. So she took a chance and got it.
Looking back, Strub said she wished she had the tools of poetry to help express how she was feeling growing up.
As Nanaimo’s new youth poet laureate, she said, now it’s her turn to help youth in the community.
“It's a fantastic way to express yourself, and especially if you know you're more existential than others, and you're like, ‘No one gets me. No one understands me. They're not in my head. They don't get it.’ Writing a poem about the way that you feel, still, people might not get you, but it's a way to express yourself that's not in a sentence with commas and periods that are supposed to make sense,” she said. “It's a form of expression in itself. So I think it's really important to have that freedom and that outlet.”
Strub said she is excited to start her role and meet more people in Nanaimo’s poetry community, and already has many ideas for what’s to come in this new position.
Funding Note: This story was produced with funding support from the Local Journalism Initiative, administered by the Community Radio Fund of Canada.