Title: On Graduation Day, a Mother’s Dream for Her Daughter Comes True

Zahra Wakilzada (SFS’23, MSFS’25) walks with her mother in Healy Circle on a bright day in May. 

Behind them, engines hum and hammers clang on the steel pillars of a graduation tent on Healy Lawn.

In a few days, Wakilzada will receive her second diploma from Georgetown — a master’s in foreign service — marking a second first in her family after earning her bachelor’s in 2023. 

It’s a moment her mother has dreamed of since Wakilzada was a little girl. Thinking about it makes her teary. All the sacrifice was worth it. A blue tint in her brown eyes glimmers.

Fariha didn’t get to live out her dream. But her daughter is. 

***

Zahra Wakilzada grew up in a warzone in a small neighborhood in Herat, Afghanistan, the country’s third-largest city. 

It took her about 10 minutes to walk to school every day. It was a short walk — but fraught.

The Taliban often targeted young girls on their way to school. Wakilzada stood out in her black dress and white hijab school uniform. 

She remembers the Taliban placing a bomb in front of her elementary school, poisoning its water, and throwing acid on girls walking to school. It was frightening and discouraging; some of her friends stopped going to school.

Still, Wakilzada kept on her route. The alternative wasn’t an option.

“My mom was really adamant about getting an education,” she said. “But [my parents] never forced me to get educated. It was their love for seeking out knowledge that carried me to school every morning, where even the shattered windows of my class echoed the resilience and hope they instilled in me.”

***

Fariha feared for her daughter’s safety every day. She knew what that walk felt like.

Fariha also grew up in a warzone during the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan. She remembers hearing explosions often. One day, while walking home from middle school, she watched rockets land in her neighborhood. Despite the danger, her parents encouraged her to return to school.

The next day, her teacher announced that one of her classmates was killed in the bombings. She laid flowers on her chair.

That was a turning point for Fariha.

“During that horrifying situation, my parents still let us go to school, and their determination inspired me, showing me how important education is for all, regardless of setbacks,” she said. “I upheld that legacy when I started my family, promising my daughters an education despite the uncertainty.”

***

Growing up, Wakilzada often sat by her mother and listened to her talk with women and young girls from their neighborhood.  

Fariha had obtained a medical certificate and worked for Doctors Without Borders. Neighbors often knocked on their front door with medical emergencies. She later worked with the Norwegian Refugee Council, led programs to build hospitals and schools in the region, taught women how to read and write, and educated them about how best to defend their rights. Wakilzada was intrigued.

“She made changes in every way possible,” she said. “Making a difference in other women’s lives, and in her own, was a form of resistance under the crushing weight of violence. And resistance became a norm, not just an act, but a way of life, blended into daily life like breath itself.”

Her mother’s fight for equality and ties to the United Nations and American NGOs drew the Taliban’s attention and attempts on her life. The family was forced to flee Afghanistan when Wakilzada was 12 in search of safety.

Upon becoming refugees in Pakistan, Wakilzada’s mother fought to enroll her in school despite restrictions due to her refugee status. Wakilzada, the only girl in her class, began attending school in the morning and working in a beauty salon in the afternoon. She also began writing poetry as a tool for activism, honing her voice as a young activist. 

Two years later, her family became refugees again, this time to the U.S.

***

Today, Wakilzada looks back on her six years at Georgetown. She studied international affairs as an undergraduate in the School of Foreign Service, received the Paul F. Pelosi fellowship, served as a senator in student government and on the editorial board of The Hoya, and helped evacuate women activists from Afghanistan after the U.S. withdrawal in 2021 while balancing school and work.

She began her master’s in foreign service during her senior year through an accelerated program. Her life experiences and passion for making a difference globally inspired her to pursue a career in diplomacy after graduating. She hopes to continue her studies and eventually pursue law school.

“As an Afghan woman, pursuing an education has always been an act of resistance. As a young survivor of the Taliban regime, the way I stand up personally in the face of their brutal dictatorship is by continuing to seek education wherever and whenever I can, pursuing the very thing the regime has made punishable by law for women inside Afghanistan,” she said.

“The Taliban can take everything from me, just as they took my childhood, but my power lies in my education — and that, they can never take away from me.” 

Wakilzada now has the tools and training that her mom didn’t have to create change. And she knows that she has a legacy to carry on for the Afghan women living under Taliban rule. 

“My mom is a cycle breaker,” Wakilzada said. “She is the one who shattered generations of oppression and erased voices by speaking up and standing up for others. She became the cycle breaker in my life. Now, it is my turn. 

“I will continue her legacy by honoring her sacrifices and using every tool at my disposal to fight for every woman, especially my sisters in Afghanistan. I see myself in the struggle of every Afghan girl still living in Afghanistan. In another world, those girls are my siblings. They are me.”

***

Back in Afghanistan, Fariha dreamed of graduating from law school and becoming a human rights lawyer. She had to put her dreams on hold when she fled her home country and sought refuge in the U.S. Those first few years were hard for her.

She got a job at Goodwill and then at Home Depot. She remembers crying on her way home from work, wondering how they would pay rent.

But she kept learning English and kept working. Watching her daughter attend Georgetown inspired her to return to school herself. She attended community college and returned to the medical field. She is now a dental assistant.

“My daughters often tell others that I inspire them, unaware that they are my very source of inspiration,” she said.

Today, her life looks different than what she thought. But looking to her daughter’s graduation, she sees her dream take shape in a different way. It’s a dream she clung to when Zahra was young; when she feared for her safety at school; when she struggled as a refugee in Pakistan and in the U.S. 

Seeing Zahra in her graduation gown is a dream come true, she said. And next year, her second daughter will graduate from Georgetown too.

“Among Georgetown’s Class of 2025 and Class of 2026, there are two Afghan women trailblazers who dared to dream, and I cannot be more proud of them,” she said.