After receiving their diplomas on Saturday, hundreds of brand new University of Findlay graduates completed the university’s most sacred tradition by walking through Griffith Memorial Arch towards Main Street.

As freshmen, the same students walked through the Arch towards Old Main to symbolize the start of their journey at UF, and tradition states that students must not walk back through the Arch until commencement, or they wouldn’t graduate.

We caught up with new graduate Samantha Bartley of Valencia, Pennsylvania after she completed the Arch Ceremony.

“It’s really awesome to participate in such a tradition,” the Animal Sciences major told WFIN.

Samantha walked in the ceremony with the service dog she’s been training for the last nine months through the UF organization 4 Paws for Ability named Jiggly. (pictured below)

As she mentioned in the audio, Jiggly will now go on to advanced training before being placed with a family with a child with disabilities.

As for Samantha, she’ll be attending veterinary school at Cornell University in the fall.

At the conclusion to Saturday’s Arch ceremony there was a marriage proposal as Christian Sauer popped the question to Brooklyn Iiames and she said said yes. (video below)

Christian earlier in the day received his doctorate and Brooklyn received her bachelor’s degree in the afternoon.

On Saturday, 440 undergrads and around 400 graduate students completed the Arch Ceremony — and around 200 students who graduated in 2020 came back to complete the tradition as well.