[4]: 44  She and her family came into close contact with Albanian patriots and American Protestant missionaries who operated a school and conducted religious services near their home in Monastir.

[4]: 63–64  She was admitted as a sophomore and graduated in 1891 with a class of eight women and received a Bachelor of Arts degree,[6] becoming the first Albanian female to complete a college education.

[14] After her graduation from college, Sevasti returned to Monastir and then to Korçë, where she joined her brother Gjerasim in opening an Albanian-language school for girls.

[4]: 93–95  She shared leadership over the following years with Luka Tira, Fanka Efthim, Thanas Sina, Grigor Cilka, Gjergj Qiriazi, and Gjon Ciko,[4]: 92  and she eventually solicited the help of the American Protestant missionaries Phineas and Violet Bond Kennedy, who arrived in Korça in 1908 (Violet was the daughter of an American Protestant missionary in Monastir, Lewis Bond, and was Sevasti's close friend throughout childhood and college).

[4]: 155–165 In summer 1904, after serving 13 years as director of the Albanian school for girls in Korça, Sevasti Qiriazi traveled to the United States.

In 1909 Sevasti was invited in her role as director of the school to take part in the Congress of Elbasan which aimed to address national education in Albania.

They spent nearly 12 months living in Bucharest and Sofia before emigrating to the United States in 1915 and settling in Natick and Southbridge, Massachusetts, where she would assist her husband in opening the first Albanian school in America at the local YMCA[4]: 173–174  They resettled in Boston (Jamaica Plain) where Sevasti assisted her sister in publishing the semi-monthly periodical Yll'i Mëngjezit / Morning Star (1917–1920), and where she and her husband became more involved in Vatra and the Albanian national cause.

In her memoirs, Sevasti described the conditions in Albania as being "primitive" and claimed she was inspired to devote the rest of her life to helping to rebuild her nation.

[4]: 186–193 Together with her husband Kristo Dako and her sister Parashqevi Qiriazi, Sevasti founded a new institution of female education in Tirana.

The school was notable for its library, athletics program, fine arts events, system of student government, and the success of its graduates.

[31] In 1933, with the nationalization of private education, the Kyrias Institute was forced to close and did not reopen despite repeated requests by the Qiriazi sisters to the government.

[32]: 184–191  Sevasti refused to allow the premises of the school to be rented by the Red Cross for humanitarian work or to be used for anything other than its original purpose for the education of women.

During this time period Sevasti's husband Kristo Dako passed away[33] and the school property was repurposed by the Italian military as a weapons depot.

Sevasti and her family were imprisoned and deported to the Banjica concentration camp near Belgrade[4]: 217–220  by pro-Nazi units led by Xhaferr Deva.

In August 1949, after unsuccessful attempts to locate Gjergj's body and with Aleksandër still in prison, Sevasti died in poverty and with a broken heart.

[4]: 217–223 From 1959 and beyond, largely due to the efforts of Skënder Luarasi,[40][41] Sevasti Qiriazi and her family began to regain recognition in Albania for their contributions to Albanian education and the emancipation of women, being decorated posthumously with the Order of Freedom (1960), the Medal for Patriotic Activity (1962) and the "Teacher of the People" (1987)[32]: 192–194 The following works or articles are known to have been written by Sevasti Qiriazi-Dako: