Updated May 29, 2025, at 11:56 a.m.

Harvard Kennedy School student Yurong “Luanna” Jiang urged her classmates to remain compassionate despite the “division, fear, and conflict” that defines the country today.

“We’re starting to believe that people who think differently, vote differently, or pray differently — whether they’re across the ocean or sitting right next to us — are not just wrong,” she said. “But it doesn’t have to be this way.”

Jiang shared personal experiences of working in Mongolia to remind her peers that though the world is large, it is also an interconnected place in which every struggle is a shared struggle.

During her speech, she praised the international diversity of the Kennedy School — with nearly 60 percent of its students coming from abroad — saying it enriched her experience at the school.

“We danced through each other’s traditions, and carried the weight of each other’s worlds,” she said. “Global challenges suddenly felt personal.”

Jiang delivered her full-throated defense of the importance of international diversity as the Trump administration threatens the fate of students from abroad at Harvard. A federal judge in Boston is currently hearing arguments from Harvard’s lawyers to decide whether to extend a stay on the Department of Homeland Security’s order last Thursday to restrict Harvard’s ability from enrolling international students.

—Staff writer Dhruv T. Patel can be reached at dhruv.patel@thecrimson.com. Follow him on X @dhruvtkpatel.

—Staff writer Grace E. Yoon can be reached at grace.yoon@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @graceunkyoon.