This story is part of the “Scholarship Stories: Where Are They Now?” series, highlighting the journeys of AUA alumni whose education was made possible through donor-supported scholarships. This story features an AUA graduate who received support from the Alumni Scholarship Endowment Fund, which played a key role in their academic and professional development.
When it came time to apply for college, there was only one local institution on Karine Ghahramanyan’s (BAPG ’25) list: the American University of Armenia (AUA). After careful research into AUA’s mission and values, she saw it as the only place in Armenia capable of offering the kind of education she had quietly yearned for: rigorous, diverse, and rooted in purpose. “I wasn’t wrong,” she reflects.
AUA became a place of transformation for Karine. She was given the space to freely explore and reinvent herself, ultimately leading her to a profound discovery of self. At AUA, things felt radically different. “Autonomy over my own learning and the sweetness of curiosity being rewarded — it all tasted like wonder served on a platter.” That wonder, she says, never left her.
But access to that experience was not guaranteed. Late one night, lying on the living room floor while a quiet documentary about Korea’s elderly sea divers played in the background, Karine checked her email and saw that she had been awarded a scholarship. “Only then did I realise how long I’d been holding my breath,” she remembers. The scholarship felt like a hard-earned treasure, a precious abalone offered after a long and uncertain dive. “It felt like a gift born of labour, yes, but also of grace.”
Today, Karine works in the Programs Department of Armenian Missionary Association of America (AMAA), a major non-profit charitable organization in Armenia, assisting the sponsorship manager. In this role, she helps support families in need, not only financially, but also in moral and educational ways. Though the work is demanding, it also offers her great gratification. “It’s allowed me to meet people where they are, listen to them, and weave their stories into my own.”
As for her future aspirations, Karine admits it is a question she often struggles to answer. One thing remains clear: she has always wanted to be a writer. “Not the kind who overexplains things or tells people what to think,” she says, “but the kind whose work lingers quietly, just beneath the surface.” She dreams of writing that confuses people, just a little, in ways that invite wonder and open doors rather than close them. Writing that leaves space: for uncertainty, for critique, for relevance, for care.
Looking back, Karine is certain that her life would have taken a different course had it not been for the support she received. Beyond the financial relief, the scholarship reshaped her understanding of generosity. “I always knew there was grace in giving generously,” she explains. “What I needed help learning was the quiet adroitness of giving: the kind done with a humility that rivals that of the receiver.” That, she says, is the truest form of generosity. The endowment scholarship arrived with no fanfare, just a gentle acknowledgment of the financial obstacles her family had long faced.
Karine describes herself as someone who rarely sits still, someone who prays for the mountain to find her and then proceeds to walk toward it anyway. But this moment of support taught her that when you have already shed enough sweat and tears, sometimes it is alright to stop moving and let the mountain come to you.
To her donor, she says she would not know where to begin. “I would probably shower them in thank-yous, too many thank-yous. But none would feel like enough.” What she truly wants to say is this: “You changed something for me. Quietly, without fanfare, you made it possible for someone like me to hold onto a future that a decade ago would have felt impossible.”
Karine’s gratitude fuels a quiet commitment to giving back. Though she envisions future support through donations or mentorship, she has already found meaning in smaller, more immediate ways, by simply sharing her story. If that helps someone feel less alone, more seen, or more hopeful, she considers that a kind of giving back, too.
With the wonder that AUA sparked, one quietly nurtured through the generosity of donors, still glowing within, she intends to ensure that future generations of students have the opportunity to seize the same experience she did.
To support the Alumni Scholarship Endowment Fund, please visit www.alumni.aua.am/alumni-endowment-fund/.