Friends and family of 826 Valencia, meet Laura Yamaguchi, our new Programs Assistant.

Laura, who has a commitment to community-based empowerment working with under-resourced students and communities of color, joins our staff to support the launch of the James Lick Writers’ Room project and our in-schools and in-house programs.

She is a San Diego native who majored in Spanish Literature and minored in Ethnic Studies at the University of California, San Diego. As a student, she was involved with campus organizing through the student organization Queer People of Color (QPOC), dedicated to empowering students and outreaching to under-resourced high school students in the greater San Diego County. Through her involvement with QPOC and the Student Initiated Outreach and Recruitment Commission, Laura organized two different high school conferences for youth with multiple and intersecting identities. Her association with the Student Affirmative Action Committee brought her to work for UCSD’s OASIS Summer Bridge Program, where she was a discussion facilitator for Summer Bridge’s social-justice based “Contemporary Issues” curriculum.

Finally, Laura made the jump to the Bay Area, first doing a labor organizing internship in Oakland as part of the Center for Third World Organizing’s Movement Activist Apprenticeship Program, and now joins 826 Valencia as our newest Program Assistant.

Welcome, Laura!