Each student's journey at Holy Cross is unique. After arriving on campus, emotions can range from the excitement of starting something new to the sadness of leaving something familiar behind and everything in between. It may take time to feel like they belong. So we’ve asked our students: when was the moment you fell in love with Holy Cross?
Elaine Kelly ’26 shares how she found a Holy Cross community over 3,000 miles away from The Hill:
"I have spent the entirety of my junior year away from Holy Cross. When I applied to spend the year at Trinity College Dublin, I was very excited for the adventures ahead, but also so terrified of leaving all of my friends at Holy Cross. I had spent my first two years building a life for myself on The Hill, and I did not want to lose everything I had built and start all over in a different country. I was worried about the time difference, communicating with my friends, finishing my degree and probably everything else a person could worry about.
All of these worries washed away as I made a new Holy Cross community, three thousand miles from campus. Going to Trinity with me were six other Holy Cross students, all as nervous as I was. Most of us did not know each other before heading across the Atlantic, and yet I will be leaving Ireland with a whole new set of friends. We bonded during our Pre-Semester Program, and have done so many things together while navigating our year abroad. We’ve traveled the world together, gone on nights out, had movie marathons, confided in each other, shared our homesickness and figured out how to live in another country.
