An immigrant, an artist and a documentarian, Ada Comstock scholar Lilo Danielyan’s journey to Smith is a story about a woman’s determination to receive an education.
“Originally I was supposed to come with my best friend, but she changed her mind. And I decided that this is a-once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I should go by myself,” said Lilo Danielyan.
Danielyan first arrived in the United States at age 19, during the summer of 2012. Migration was not an unfamiliar experience in her life. Danielyan was born in Armenia during the First Nagorno-Karabakh War. At two years old, she moved to Kazakhstan with her family, the place where she grew up and partially attended university. When she received the visa to participate in a program called Work and Travel USA, Danielyan left home and traveled to Portsmouth, New Hampshire to work as a prep cook in the kitchen.
“I worked the entire summer. I really like being in America, and I was terrified of the idea of going back home, graduating university and not knowing what to do next. It was just really hard to make it anywhere in my country as a woman, without connections, without money,” she said.
Danielyan explained that at the time, young Armenian women in Kazakhstan often faced pressure to marry young. Not ready to start a family, she wanted to continue her education and decided against going home.
Despite her parents’ discouragement, Danielyan stayed in the U.S. after her work program, applying for visa extensions and working different jobs. In the next five years, she saved up money, learned to drive a car, established residency and navigated through the system of community college.
The process of returning to school has been an isolating one, where Danielyan is often hampered by the financial cost, lack of access to transportation and the bureaucracy of transferring credits. Before transferring to Smith, she had spent many semesters at the Southern Maine Community College and the University of Southern Maine with scholarships, working part-time on the side.
“I felt isolated as an older student. I didn’t have time to make connections with professors because of working all the time. And when you do it all yourself, it took such a long time to figure things out, the logistics, the paperworks. You just felt like you didn’t belong to this place,” she said.
Danielyan remembers one of her professors mentioning a program for women older than 24, encouraging her to seek out the opportunity. Shortly after, Danielyan submitted her application to Smith’s Ada program and was accepted.
Now at Smith, Danielyan is a psychology major with a passion for photography, specializing in documentary film. She also does commercial work on the side. The two fields are intricately linked in her mind. Artistically, she enjoys exploring areas that relate to people, trauma and migration. Her understanding of those subjects has been deepened by her psychology studies, bringing new perspectives to inform her artistic choice. For practical reasons, Danielyan majored in psychology to buffer the stigma in her family against pursuing an artistic field, knowing that Smith’s open curriculum would give her the freedom to take classes across disciplines.
“Photography is more than just a hobby. It’s more like a passion, and I will continue doing it no matter what. Maybe until I reach some sort of conclusion for myself. I am doing that because that’s something important for me,” she said.
Compared to her previous college experience, Danielyan feels more at home at Smith. She brings her life experiences to the classroom, sharing her perspective as an immigrant and the struggles of speaking English as a second language.
She was touched when a fellow classmate reached out to her in a letter last semester, thanking her for bringing those perspectives.
“Sometimes I feel like I’m like an older sibling [in the classroom]. It goes both directions. I also learned so much from discussion with traditional students. I like trying to connect to them and not to separate myself from the group based on age difference,” she said.
Regarding her plans after Smith, Danielyan considers going back to Armenia and producing a short documentary film. She is also thinking about joining an organization called TUMO, a free education center for disadvantaged Armenian teenagers to specialize in technology and design.
“I would really love to connect with them, get involved, maybe teach a course. I keep going back there for some reason. I think I want to do something for my community back home,” she said.
(Photo provided by Lilo Danielyan)
