Welcome to Iris Shanyue Tang’s World
Discover the rich tapestry of Iris’s life through her personal stories and shared memories. Each narrative offers a glimpse into her experiences and reflections.
- Iris’s Senior Year Book reflection, May 2025
What I’ll Miss Most: LGSD and crew <3
What I’ll Be Remembered For: The horde of whiteboard garfields
Advice For My Freshman Self: Pls pls pls invest in a planner
- Iris’s Swim Team Senior poster
Farewell and appreciation messages from her Lakeside Swim Team friends and teammates, November 2024
| Message | From |
|---|---|
| Iris!! you’re such a big presence in the team, and I’m going to miss you so much! GL in the future! | pia |
| Iris!! My incredibly intelligent weelo!! I’ll never forget our ‘amazing’ co-op drawings freshman (bring that back when??), you were one of my first friends here. I’m so glad we’re still friends. You’r the bestest comother to our children and I love talking to you about anime and manga (sorry for outing you). Let’s hang out and make so many memories senior year. I love you so much and I know you’ll do amazing wherever you end up. Please please please keep in touch. I love you!! | M. |
| IRIS! As 1 out of 3 m.. in our swim family, I love your … I love your spirit and.. I have more to say in person but please never stop your beautiful … jobs! | A. |
| I’m so lucky to have you in my family this year, we’ll miss you!! | |
| Iris! I’ve absolutely loved swimming with you these past few years! | |
| … You’re so kind and amazing. Stay awesome | J. |
| My dearest bookie – will say more when I see you – and the other half of my IM – you are my roots and support in swim and I could not have done this w/out you. IMY! All of my love | Lexi |
| Iris!! You’re one of the coolest kids ever! I’ve loved swimming in a lane with you! You’re one of the most supportive people I’ve ever met, so I love you. You’re a troque! | J. |
| Iris! I will never forget you waving to me last year, and how happy that made freshman me. You are so sweet and the best teammate ever! I’ll miss you so much! Come visit! | Siddhi |
| Hi Iris, Thank you for always being there for me! I can’t believe you are going and I’ll miss you! I loved having my … with you! | Brisa |
| Good luck in the future, Congrats!! | Vansea |
| Iris! You bring such a positive and hardworking attitude to everything you do. You are so dedicated to this team and have helped make LGSD so special! | Ella |
| Thanks for being a great swim mom and friend — I always appreciate your cheerful energy and I will miss you so much! | Amber P |
| Thanks for always being such a fun & kind presence over the last few years. Can’t wait for the rest of senior year! | Caroline |
| Iris!! my relay buddy!! I’ll miss you!! good luck next year !! | Stephanie |
| IRIS!!! what am I going to do without u next season. Swimming the 5 free w/ u has always been so fun and I will miss our silly chats. I love U | Allie |
| Iris! Thank you for the awesome swim season. Good luck — we’ll miss you! | Ellie |
| Hi Iris, We’ll miss you on the team. Good luck after high school! | |
| Iris— I’ll miss our laughs in Yoga Fusion as well as your kind and calm nature — I always love talking to you. Wishing you the best for next year! | Amber |
| Iris! We’re gonna miss you so much next year, and it’s going to be sad showing up to practice and not see your face. Best of luck for everything that comes next, whatever it may be you’ll crush it (!!) we miss you. | Isobel |
| YOU’RE SOOOO NICE !!! WHAT THE HECK ?!? YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY AWESOME !! Thanks for spreading Kindness <3 | Alice |
| Iris! I’ll miss you so much. Thanks for always being kind + cheerful 🙂 | Audrey |
| Iris! Thank you for all the amazing memories, we’ll miss you so much! | Anastasia |
| Iris! We’ll miss you and your energy so much! Have fun next year 🙂 | Chelsea |
| Iris! you are so positive + fun to be around, we’ll miss u <3 | Eliza |
| Iris! You are so kind and hard working and I am so glad to have gotten to know you over the last few years! Miss you! Love you! | Noli |
| Iris, I’m so glad I got to know you. We’ll miss you | Lucia |
| Iris!! Gonna miss your smiles at practice next year — I hope you have so much fun wherever you’re going next 🙂 <3 | Maggie |
| Iris! You are so positive and kind and I will really miss you on the team. | N. |
- Iris’s Garfields
Iris drew this image in January 2024, during an Advanced Physics unit on the biomechanics of concussions. Garfield became the unofficial mascot for the unit.
Students would protest if/when I erased any of Iris’s many Garfield drawings. As a compromise, I photographed her drawings before erasing them and posted the photos on Canvas.
– from her Advanced Physics teacher
- Iris after capsize
This photo shows Iris (right) and a few of her teammates. It was April Fool’s Day 2022 and they had just flipped in a quad in the Sammamish Slough as novices. Iris had been coxing because we trusted her and coxing a quad in the slough with high, fast-moving water is very challenging! The boat did not flip due to Iris! It was the rowers who pulled their oars in – away from a boat on a dock that they didn’t want to hit. It was a hilarious day and the girls were absolute champs about it. It was COLD and they had been in the water for longer than they should have been and I had to take their photo because they were laughing so hard and I was so proud of them! I call this “2nd tier fun” – the fun that happens when doing something very challenging and physically difficult! A delightful day that I’ll never forget. Oh, Iris!
– from Coach D. L.
- Iris at Robotics Competition, January 2022 (from her Advanced Physics teacher)
Iris and some of her teammates make
last-minute changes to their
robot before the competition
Iris and some of her teammates make
last-minute changes to their
robot before the competition
Iris (second to left) and other robotics students watching the robotics competition
Iris (right) and other Lakeside robotics students posing with an award
that they won at a Vex
Robotics competition in January 2022.
The award was given
in recognition of the team’s
excellent documentation of
their robot designs in their
project notebook. Iris played
a major role in maintaining
the notebook.
- Iris got interviewed by her classmate, Lakeside Middle School, September 2017
“Iris wants to be a videogame tester when she grows up. She says that it would be fun to test out the video games. Iris’s 2nd choice is to be a youtuber. She wants to be a youtuber because it’s fun. She will also be able to over exaggerate things when she makes videos, which will be about whatever she feels like. Her videos will also be animated. Of course, Iris will also like to meet other you tubers.”
“Iris does an annual camping trip with her family, and usually goes to the beach. Her favorite part is going out into the wilderness, and being with her friends, who sometimes come along. She goes hiking and roasts marshmallows on a campfire, to make s’mores!”
“Iris is the best at math out of all the subject. However, her favorite subject is reading, not math. Math is her 2nd favorite. Iris loves reading. Her favorite genre is fantasy because it’s interesting and anything can happen. Her favorite series is the Heroes of Olympus but, she doesn’t have a favorite book because she likes them all!”
“Iris considers herself an average swimmer. Her favorite stroke is backstroke because it is not tiring. She doesn’t like butterfly because it’s so tiring to move your arms back. At the swim meets, she tries to conserve her energy. She swims at Pro club, 3–4 times a week. Iris even got into the finals at a swim meet once!”
– by A. F.
- A note from Iris’s 4th-grade teacher, reflecting on her character and strengths
“Iris: She is imaginative. She’s smart in reading and terrific at math. Iris is very positive. She is kind. Iris, you are happy and nice. She is good at mental math. She is one of the people trying not to be seen — it’s awesome! Iris, I’ve liked being in the same class with you three years in a row! She’s a good friend with great ideas! Iris is a nice person to work with in small group discussions. Iris, you are quiet, but fun.”
- Shared memories from Iris’s teachers, coaches, classmates, and friends collected during the Visitation at Iris’s Duvall home around December 2025
| Shared Memories | Shared By |
|---|---|
| Walking with you from the bus stop and taking the bus with you and [R.] was the highlight of my middle school years. I loved spending art class with you and talking in the hallways. | F. W. |
| My first (and favorite!) crew carpool was w/ Iris… It was her, a junior; a sophomore girl who is now a senior I love dearly; and a senior boy now graduated, who was probably sick of us. Me, as a little freshman, had never laughed so hard as I have in that carpool. It is without fail one of my favorite crew memories. | |
| I had physics with Iris junior and senior year of high school. While we were one of the only girls in the class, I always felt comfortable knowing Iris was there with me. She is absolutely one of the smartest people I know. I also always appreciated her steady, calm presence at crew practice. | S. T. |
| When we were in Winter Crew together, Iris used to always draw her adorable Garfields all over the whiteboards during/before practice. I loved seeing them & they were so funny 🙂 Best wishes to everyone & fly high, Iris. We miss you. | V. |
| Talking about Hatsune Miku & Vocaloid in the morning before class and at regattas always brought me so much joy and inspiration. Your art in psych never failed to amaze me and I’m so glad we could bond over music; it gave me so much strength and warmth when I needed it most. Your presence really grounded me and helped me grow into the person I am today, and I really miss you. | B. H. |
| I’m so grateful that I have too many great memories of Iris to be limited to one. She was such a bright presence on our team. I will miss her every day. | S. G. |
| Iris was the loveliest, kindest person. A true gem of a person and a wonderful teammate. She never shied away from being her best self or from helping others shine. She will be so missed by this world. We all needed her. | Coach B. |
| Thank you for everything. Thank you for being you. I’ll miss you, Iris Tang. | |
| Iris has been such a good classmate and friend. I will cherish all the memories we had at our Lakeside years. I remember Iris’s big smile at the “walk down the red carpet” event. | W. L. |
| I had the privilege of being in Drawing & Painting with Iris for several years in high school. Not only was I constantly in awe of her artistry and skill, but I always loved being in the studio with her and laughing, enjoying leftover art club snacks. It was so impressive watching her senior show come together — I loved seeing her marker illustrations and prints as they went up on the wall. | A. L. |
| [A.] was so enriched by sharing her time with Iris from 5th grade through high school, especially in their COVID cohort & high school art classes. [A.] never failed to tell me about Iris’s artistic talents and I have seen them as well. We are so sorry for your loss. | L. L. |
| Iris was an absolute joy to be around! She always smiled at me whenever we passed, no matter in rain or shine. Her friendly nature always made me comfortable around her and I greatly enjoyed her presence! “Don’t cry because it ended. Smile because it happened.” | L. |
| Iris, it would not be amiss to say that you were one of my greatest influences in life. 80%, maybe even 90% of my memories growing up are with you, and those have shaped me to become the person I am today. I hope in some shape or way you’ll see me one day and be proud of the influence that you’ve had. All the memories from book/Origins club, all of the math (and I mean ALL of it). Although I fell out of love with math, I realized that I really only enjoyed it because of the people (you!!). You were the reason I still wanted to do math. Countless pizza slices eaten and lots of Microsoft clams later, I think it will take an eternity for me not to linger on our cherished memories. Wishing you forever love and peace ❤️ your partner in crime, always. | J. |
| Do you remember the Pokémon dex that we stole from the boys’ Origins club bookbox? How broken and battered it was, yet we giggled over every page. I have a feeling that together we could still ace a Sporcle quiz on naming all the Pokémon. All the long Wednesday afternoons when we would sit against the wall in the gym and play on Chris’s 3DS because my mother confiscated mine. Of course you liked Vaxei and I wish I had believed higher in you. I know we would’ve bonded very well over OSU and Manga 💜 I’ll always remember you as the kindest girl I know, the one who heard me out no matter what and always had my back. Our days will do not seem to get longer. | J. |
| Iris was always such a lovely, positive presence. She would always win Anomia games when we played in advisory, and I always loved seeing her Garfield drawings on the whiteboards. She was a wonderful Latin classmate as well, always funny and sweet, and a joy to be around. 💜 | E. C. |
| My first treasured memory of Iris is at rowing practice. Not only was she easily one of the strongest people on the team but she brought so much humor and joy to the team. I knew that Iris was happy when I could hear her laugh and see her smile. I am so glad I got to know Iris through rowing. She was such an amazing, kind and intelligent person. | K. M. |
- Shared memories from Iris’s parents
- After years of swim and crew practices, Iris became quite strong and muscular. Whenever we went shopping together, she liked to help by carrying the heavy items for us—things like a bag of rice or a big watermelon. More than once, we saw her carrying a 25-pound bag of rice in one arm and another 25-pound bag of flour in the other. She was a wonderful shopping helper.
- Iris loved both the Lakeside swim team and the crew team. Because of scheduling conflicts, she couldn’t practice both in the same season. With permission from the coaches, she decided to swim in the fall and row with the crew team in the spring.
One side effect of this arrangement was that the calluses on her hands from a season of rowing would soften during the following swim season. When crew practice started again in the spring, she had to go through the blister-to-callus process all over again. We suggested that she focus on just one sport to avoid repeating this painful cycle, but she wouldn’t hear of it. She continued training with both teams until she graduated from Lakeside. - Iris spoke Mandarin at home. However, she sometimes struggled with certain Chinese words and expressions. For example, Mandarin has two different words for the pronoun “we/us”: zánmen (咱们), which refers to a group that includes both the speaker and the listener, and wǒmen (我们), which is more general and can refer either to the speaker and the listener together or to the speaker and others excluding the listener.
When Iris talked to us about her school activities, she always used zánmen. We would remind her that she should use wǒmen, since we were not actually present at those activities. Each time we pointed this out, she would pretend to cry and say, “Chinese is so hard,” and then burst into laughter. She kept making the same “mistake,” and eventually we just gave up. 🙁 - Iris loved spending time on projects and problems that interested her, often working on them until she felt they were just right. For example, she participated in the North American Computational Linguistics Open Competition in 2023. She became especially fascinated with the “Wordnet Battleship” problem and devoted most of her time to solving it. As a result, her overall score in the competition was not particularly high, but her solution to that problem stood out, and she received the Best Solution Award for it.
- Iris loved riding roller coasters. During one winter break, we went to Great America Theme Park with the family of one of her friends. Iris and her friend were eager to ride one of the roller coasters, but they were still too young and did not meet the minimum height requirement.
Determined to try anyway, they stood on their tiptoes at the height-measurement pole and managed to pass the initial check. However, when they were about to get on the ride, the staff noticed and asked them to step aside. They were not allowed to ride after all.
Instead of feeling disappointed, the two of them found the whole situation hilarious. They giggled about it and teased each other about their “clever plan” for days afterward.
- Stories from Iris’s writings
- At her high school graduation, one of Iris’s friends told her that she was many other people’s number one fan, even though no one had done the same for her. Iris wrote about this in her diary and noted how deeply touching she found it.
- See more stories from Iris’s perspective in her Writing Journal 2015 on the Writings Page