For the tenth year, Elon international students planted oak saplings in a grove on South Campus on May 21 - a symbol of their growth during their time at Elon.
Huria Tahiry ’26 says, even though she is from Afghanistan, at Elon, she never felt like she was far from home.
“I always thought, ‘This is home,’ and right now I’m leaving, and think, ‘Am I leaving home?’ It’s the same feeling I had when I left home (Afghanistan) years ago,” said Tahiry, a computer science major and the first recipient of the Commitment to Democracy Scholarship, dedicated to refugee students.
Tahiry was one of about 20 graduating international students, along with their families, who planted their oak sapling in the international student tree grove on May 21, an Elon tradition now celebrating 10 years. When new students arrive at Elon, they receive an acorn and, when they leave, they are gifted a sapling at Senior Baccalaureate. Because international students usually cannot take the sapling home, they have planted their trees in a grove by the Harden Clubhouse.
Denise Teeters, director of international student services, welcomed the students and reminded them of the symbolic nature of the sapling, representing their growth from a first-year student to a graduate.
“Over the last several years, you have grown academically and personally. You learned how to navigate differences, how to build friendships across cultures and languages, and how to speak with courage. Some of you didn’t speak much when you got here, and then, all of a sudden, you grew, you built that courage to speak and also embraced the Elon community,” said Teeters. “Through all this, you’ve seen how growth takes time, just like saplings take time to grow.”
Before students planted their saplings, President Connie Ledoux Book also noted how, just like an oak tree, Elon is also built on connection.
“It’s the root systems that are so critical,” Book said. “You have to have a grove. You need other oak trees for an oak tree to prosper. And that is true about the Elon network.”