Oh the Places You’ll Go - Allegra Kirkland, Politics Editor at Teen Vogue.

In the modern age, more than ever, journalism and the news are in the palms of citizens everywhere. Anyone and everyone is able to be a reporter, the firsthand account of what is going on. However, this has brought an onslaught of the ever-popular fake news, false information, and straight-up lies being spread like wildfire across the internet. Allegra Kirkland is a New York City resident, mother, journalist, Oberlin graduate, and current Politics Director at Teen Vogue. 

I had the chance to interview Kirkland, getting a closer look at the responsibilities of a working journalist in Lower Manhattan and the world today. As I walked through the streets of Manhattan to get to One World Trade, the location of Teen Vogues office, thoughts were swarming my head about who Allegra would be, the kind of conversations we would have, and what her job was like, especially after earning her spot at one of the top media companies in 2025. Teen Vogue has been consistently rising back into the spotlight, increasingly speaking out on different social and political issues across the globe. After I got through the security of the building and we had secured our respective iced lattes (which Kirkland very kindly got for us), we sat down, and I got to hear some of Kirkland's thoughts. 

Allegra Kirkland

Lucy Anderson: Who are you? Do you want to give us a little bio, name, place, etc?

Allegra Kirkland: Of course, sure. I'm Allegra Kirkland. I'm the politics director at Teen Vogue, and I've been here since 2019, so almost six years. I just oversee basically everything that lives in the politics section, so all of our coverage of education, and what's going on in Congress, and the courts, and our history coverage, immigration, climate change, and just, like, you know, minor stuff. That's just minor stuff, yeah.

LA: So, Teen Vogue for six years, but before that, what were you doing? What was your path up to Teen Vogue? 

AK: Yeah, so before that, I loved to stay in places forever, apparently. I was at this publication called Talking Points, I don't know for... five-plus years, and I did, like, every job. That was where I came up, I guess. I did every single job there... You kind of learn how to do everything when no one's expecting you to know how to do it all yet. It's useful. It also just gives you more respect for everyone's job in the newsroom. 

I knew I wanted to be writing and stuff. So I was writing while doing those other jobs. And then, I became a news writer on the 6 am shift. So I had to get to the office at six in the morning every day- but it was good training because there was no one else on. 

That was a crash course. And then I became a reporter, covering national politics. But my little beats were voting rights and far-right extremism. And then, I was a reporter on that last job before I came to Teen Vogue.

LA: Wow. Amazing. Do you think anything within your job might surprise people? Is there something that maybe even surprised you in terms of, like, subject matter or what the role involves?

AK: I like it, self-consciously, but it's accurate; I joke that 50% of my job is just sending and receiving emails. Like, it's crazy. Just because we don't have staff writers, we work exclusively with freelancers, which is so interesting. I think that's very unique. Fielding pitches all day long. And I really do want to, especially because we work with so many, like, early-career writers and students. Like, I don't want to leave people hanging. So it takes a long fucking time. That's the least sexy part of the job. Is responding to emails. Also, there was a lot of project management in terms of just bringing different parts of our team together. That I actually really enjoy. 

LA: That's a very niche talent, finding the people who you think will do well together. 

AK: I'm just being like, “okay, the social video team is annoyed about this thing” and “we need to keep this moving” and “what's the deadline for that?” And I don't know. It's just a lot of moving parts, so you're kind of [always] reading emails. 

LA: You're in politics, and out of the four main columns that Teen Vogue does. There is immigration, environmental justice, government, and history. Is there any one of those categories that really draws you to the politics column? Or is there a column you feel you most drawn to?

AK: Yeah, that's [all] stuff I am interested in. But, I think education is something I've just kind of gotten more involved with since being at Teen Vogue, because we didn't do a lot of the coverage of my past job. I just think it still lends into everything else that's happening in the country right now. We see all the attacks on trans youth, start in schools, and bathroom bans and things like that. All the anti-DEI stuff. It all kind of grew out of the Department of Education being shut down. So I just think that it's such a fascinating [topic]. 

LA: Yes. The history of education is very interesting. How it started out as just shoving kids in a room to get them to learn how to sit still, to what we have now, is very interesting. 

AK: And surveillance. Like, we're running this piece soon. The Knight Institute at Columbia is filing this lawsuit against this Texas school district for using these ED tech programs that basically, track every single word that kids type on their school-issued laptops and stuff - and it's supposed to be for flagging mental health concerns, but, obviously, that could be used by overzealous people.

LA: What has been your favorite part of your journalism career so far? I know that's, like, a huge sphere, but is there anything that really sticks out to you? 

AK: Yeah. I mean, this probably sounds corny, but I really love working with student journalists. Like, I don't know. I just think it's so fun and engaging. And I learn so much from the pitches we get. And, I've worked with so many teenagers who are more professional and better writers than 34-year-olds. And, like, one specific project was for the election last year. We had this group of student journalist correspondents who were in battleground states. And they were such wonderful human beings.

LA: The most radical people come from some of the most difficult places to live. The most difficult places to be radical. 

AK: Right. And when I'm, like, “oh, my God, how am I still in this industry?” Then I meet people who really want to. I'm like “okay… maybe this job is awesome”.

LA: Exactly. Well, I have one last question for you. Because of all of your work in activism and politics, and the care that you seem to really have for all of these issues. Are there any pieces of advice that you want to give to student journalists and those teenagers who want to make a change, and who want to follow a path like yours? 

AK: Yeah, some cliche ones, but generally just finding community. Finding like-minded people, finding people who can help you along the way, whether it's mentor figures or just peers who you can be, like, “I'm applying for this job, can you look at my cover letter?”. It is nice to have people who care about the same things you care about. (and) Don't worry about having the perfect internship, the perfect career path. It's okay to take a nonlinear one.

Stay updated with Teen Vogue @teenvogue on socials and here. Thank you to Allegra Kirkland and the staff at Teen Vogue for the interview. All photos provided and approved by Allegra Kirkland.

This interview has been edited for length.