2023 Senior Awardee: Isabelle Charles, A23

Hometown: Milton, Massachusetts

Major(s): English and Africana Studies

Isabelle Charles is a senior from Milton, MA, majoring in English and Africana studies. Her family hails from Haiti, Jamaica, and Panama. During her tenure at Tufts, she was President of the Tufts English Society, Co-President of The Ladies of Essence Acapella Group, Poetry and Prose Editor of The Tufts Observer where she edited student work on a regular basis and led the Creative Issue, and Editor-in-Chief of Onyx magazine. 

Isabelle has worked as an Editorial Intern for Transition Magazine, also known as, "The Magazine of Africa and the Diaspora," at The Harvard Hutchins Center for African and African American Research. Over the years, Transition has attracted literary authors and scholars from Nobel Laureate, Wole Soyinka, to Ngugi wa Thiong'o, Chinua Achebe, V.S. Naipaul, James Baldwin, Julius Nyerere, and many others. As an Editorial Intern, she published an article on Haiti’s double debt to France and neo-colonialism based on an archival piece by John de St. Jorre’s “Looking for Mercenaries.” Isabelle has also served as a production intern for Basic Black, a show on GBH, Boston's PBS member station. She was able to research show topics that ranged from Roe vs. Wade, to Black Maternal Health, and Cryptocurrency, among other responsibilities. 

Passionate about writing, storytelling, and amplifying marginalized voices, she has mentored and tutored elementary to high school level students in English literature, language, and writing.

Isabelle is also the 2023 Wendell Phillips Award recipient and was chosen to be the student speaker during Commencement Weekend. In her free time, she enjoys cycling with friends, planting, and cooking.