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2020 Silk Road School Degree Awarding and Graduation Ceremony
2020 Silk Road School (SRS) Degree Awarding and Graduation Ceremony was held successfully at the lobby of Kaitai Building in Renmin University of China, Suzhou Campus on 1st July 2020, Wednesday. This was the SRS’s first graduation ceremony since its founding in 2018. Adopting a live streaming method, graduates were invited to interact online and offline, celebrating this special and solemn graduation ceremony together. The ceremony officially began as the national anthem thundered through the lobby.
Teachers and students expressed their condolences to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) victims and those sacrificed in the fight against the pandemic by observing a minute of silence.
The love and relationships forged during the 2 years will be unaffected by the distance, mountain, water, or a screen separating them physically. Thoughts and blessings of school leaders, teachers and classmates who were unable to attend the ceremony was conveyed through videos.
Valedictorian Helena Avdjukevica from Latvia said that the learning experience in SRS allow students to master the knowledge, broaden their horizons and gain friendships. The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) proposed by President Xi Jinping in 2013, provided a peaceful development plan for the world. Together with her classmates, she hopes to play a part in strengthening the cooperation and exchanges between China and the world.
Fang Weiwei, Secretary of the Party Committee of Suzhou Campus, announced the list of outstanding graduates from the cohort, in no particular order, Anastasia Stepanova, Helena Avdjukevica, Lily Suryani Surjono, Majid Karimi, Maria Jose Haro Sly, Polina Smirnova, Shafiullah Farzayee, Shokhrukh Ashrafi, Tamil Selvan Ramachandran, Tatevik Petrosyan. Congratulations to them!
BRI has entered a new stage of comprehensive construction, and there is a high demand for talents who are cross-disciplinary, cross-cultural, familiar and specialised in the BRI countries. After 2 years of studies in SRS, these talents will be able to promote construction within the BRI countries and sharing China’s development experience with the world, beginning a new chapter of building a community with a shared future for mankind.
Posts on social media that day captured many shared memories, the friendship forged between teachers and students, those fun happy times in class, in dormitories or on trips as well as those bittersweet moments. At the end of the day, the party came to an end and there was a tinge of sadness when they bid each other goodbye on the wechat group.
Congratulations once again to the 1st cohort of SRS graduates, your hard work has paid off! All the best in your future endeavours.
Written by: Lim Yin Ru
Edited by: Edward Kwame Tenadu
