She is a co-founder of Pacific Tongues and a long time mentor and coach with its award winning youth poetry program, Youth Speaks Hawaiʻi. Lyz is currently working towards a PhD in English at University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa. She has performed in Hawaiʻi, Aotearoa, Papua New Guinea and the continental United States. Her collaborative work with visual artist Joy Enomoto and her fellow poets in Pacific Tongues sustain her. Last, but far from least, she is the proud mother of Jakob, who always shows her the best stairway to climb.