Yara Shahidi Officially Graduates from Harvard University: 'Celebrating All Week'

Afshin Shahidi/Instagram

Yara Shahidi is officially a college grad!

On Thursday, the 22-year-old Grown-ish star graduated from Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Per the institution's website, commencement for the 2021-2022 academic year was held in person on Wednesday and Thursday.

Shahidi's father, Afshin, commemorated the occasion by sharing a selfie of the pair at Harvard. In the shot, the actress wore her cap and gown.

"Beautifully surreal moment seeing our delicate petal in full bloom," he captioned the photo.

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Shahidi has been anticipating the milestone for several days on social media. On Tuesday, she shared a photo of herself as a kid putting up two fingers, adding the caption: "Officially graduating in ✌🏽 days."

"Celebrating ALL week!" she wrote alongside a second photo, which also featured her mom, Keri. "T MINUS ☝️ DAY AWAY FROM GRADUATION 👩🏾‍🎓."

In a photo with her brothers, Shahidi said she's "sharing this special moment with my most special day one's." The black-ish alum also posted a Boomerang to her Instagram Story, featuring her posing alongside some of her classmates.

Yara Shahidi/Instagram

Shahidi told Vogue she studied within the institution's Social Studies & African American departments, concentrating on "Black political thought under a neocolonial landscape." She completed a 136-page thesis paper before accepting her diploma.

"It's surreal to have finally hit this major milestone," she added. "I've known I wanted to go to college since I was four. By 17, I knew exactly what I wanted to study, so to see that come to fruition is a goal fulfilled."

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Shahidi got into the Ivy League school in 2017. She once told PEOPLE in 2016 of her plans to defer for at least a year.

"I know when Malia Obama announced [she was deferring], she got a lot of [flack], but I feel like what's interesting is I know so many people that are deferring," she said at the time. "It's more than to just roam around or just sit down and stare at a wall, but it will also give me an opportunity to work."

She continued, "I've been working more than half of my life and that's always been balanced with school and all of the other responsibilities, so to have a year to focus on work and to focus on specified interests will be nice before I pick a career and choose what I want to study and my life path."

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Shahidi previously told Seventeen she "got into every college" she applied to, including Yale University, Spelman College and Stanford University. But Harvard had always been her dream school.

"I've wanted to be a history professor for longer than I've wanted to be an actress," she revealed on Jimmy Kimmel Live! in 2018. "And so I used to have the Harvard webpage up, and I'd go through the course catalog. So needless to say, this is something I've been planning for a long time."