During the 2025–2026 academic year, guided by the vision and leadership of Director Dr. Lisa Gilman, the Institute for Immigration Research (IIR) launched Leaving and Belonging, a digital storytelling initiative developed as part of its arts, culture, and storytelling initiative. This project complements the IIR’s broader mission to generate and amplify relevant research on immigrants and immigration to the United States by pairing research on migration with community engagement, using storytelling to amplify personal narratives and highlight lived experiences.
Over the course of this academic year, the Leaving and Belonging project invited Mason students (regardless of immigration status) to reflect on what it means to leave a place they cared about, adapt to a new environment, and create a sense of home in an unfamiliar setting. IIR Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Dr. Ezgi Benli-Garcia leads the project in collaboration with Graduate Research Assistant, Aditi Goel and Undergraduate Research Assistant, Chris Vitello. Thus far, the team has conducted over thirty interviews with George Mason University undergraduate and graduate students. They have also connected with many students by participating in events hosted by George Mason’s registered student organizations, including the Center for Leadership and Intercultural Engagement (CLIE), UndocuMason, and No Lost Generation (NLG). Through tabling, presentations, and conversations at events, the team shared information about IIR’s programs and resources and strengthened IIR’s relationships across campus.
These qualitative interviews captured perspectives of movement, home, and belonging from students connected to a wide range of regions, including Asia, Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, the Caribbean, North America, and U.S. local and diasporic communities. The interviews revealed several clear themes including that leaving one place and struggling into a new location is a common experience for all people, regardless of whether or not they have experienced moving to a new country. Furthermore, belonging is not fixed; it is shaped by individual experience and is continually negotiated and renegotiated. As Abhigya Pandey, a student featured in the project, reflected:
“Obviously Nepal is home, but I feel like if my people are with me, my home is with me. I feel like home is more people than place”
Throughout the interviews, students emphasized that access to the arts, sports, food, and cultural practices associated both with home and the new location fosters comfort, connection, and well-being in a new place. One student-athlete, Lucero Salgado, explained:
“I was trying to fit into not only the sports team, but the country and community. It was one of the best decisions [to join a softball team]... It took me out of the depression I was in and after that I started going back to myself before moving here.”
Many participants identified student-led organizations as important sites of agency and belonging. Their lived experiences demonstrated the importance of building stronger networks of visibility, care, and collaboration across Mason.
Leaving and Belonging is grounded in careful consideration of how stories are gathered, represented, and shared, particularly when working with vulnerable communities. Looking ahead, the project points to an important next phase: developing ethical digital storytelling practices and tools that can support students, faculty, and campus partners in creating, preserving, and sharing stories responsibly.
Please visit IIR’s website and social media accounts to hear these stories directly from Mason students themselves!