Davis & Elkins College alumni are coming home. “Home” is magnetic. It tugs at our hearts like a favorite melody, drawing us back again as surely as a moth to a flame. Childhood homes leave their mark, but so do the other “homes” we are blessed to discover once we step beyond that first safe haven.
Last month in this column, I reflected on how our students experience “home” at D&E. This month let us celebrate the irresistible pull our campus still has for alumni.
Kelsey Young graduated from D&E in 2014. Last month, Kelsey Young, Ph.D. joined our faculty. When she first traveled from her Woodbridge, VA home at age 17 to visit our campus, she was instantly smitten. As an exercise science major, she quickly found mentors in Drs. Mary Ann DeLuca and Jennifer Riggleman. As their student, advisee, and work-study, Kelsey realized early in her college journey that she wanted to return one day to work alongside these two influential professors. Eleven years later, Dr. Kelsey Young has indeed returned home to D&E—where dreams really do come true.
In her own words: “Coming back to D&E feels like coming home to my own story. It is where my dreams first took shape and where I found belonging. Now, stepping back onto this campus, I feel the joy of giving back to the place that helped make me who I am.”
Kelsey’s return also reflects her enduring passion for learning, a passion first sparked at D&E. She shared: “I am a lifelong learner. I was told a long time ago, we are given an opportunity every day to learn something new, and we should never take it for granted. ‘The day you stop learning is the day you die.’”
I am deeply grateful to Dr. Young for returning to her alma mater and welcome her home. Here, she will inspire and mentor countless students, just as she once was inspired. As I was taught in my own home: to those who are blessed, much is expected, and they, in turn, are called to be a blessing.
October 10th to 12th all D&E alumni are invited “home” for Homecoming 2025. Members of the Class of 1975 will mark their 50th reunion, alongside many others who will return to reminisce, renew old friendships, make new ones, and experience the familiar and the new on a campus that continues to shape lives.
Like Kelsey, generations of Davis & Elkins sons and daughters hear the call to return. Once again, in these picturesque Allegheny Mountains, family members gather, stories intertwine, and journeys intersect. As the wise saying reminds us, you can indeed come home again.
And at D&E, when you do, the welcome is always waiting.
The journey continues…
Chris A. Wood
President
Davis & Elkins College
