Hello, my name is Marielena Peña. I previously graduated from Miami Dade College with honors and received my A.A. degree in fall 2015, which was also when I started FIU. I have now graduated from FIU as well since May 2018 with a B.A. degree in Psychology from the Honors College, in Magna Cum Laude and aiming to complete a Master's degree in Global Strategic Communications. I never knew what direction I wanted to go towards but I have always tried learning from as many areas as I can, generally about global issues or culture and arts, environment. Though from the time before graduating at Dade, I thought of doing psychology as it pertains to both sciences and humanities, which had always interested me and decided to take that as my major for bachelors in the fully online program. After taking some courses based on my major and personal experiences along the way with getting along with others in good terms, I plan on trying to be a counselor or more specifically a licensed mental health counselor, by getting an M.A. in counseling psychology at FIU.

So because of knowing where I can go later on, I wanted to make myself stand out more by being part of both the Honors College and GL Medallion program as well as working on a research paper and other activities that can help me be more aware of my surroundings. I did also receive a certificate for Academy of Leaders during my first semester at FIU and participated in the peer education program training. Also, since taking the REL3075 course, I started being more interested in the topic and wanted to take similar courses to use them to get a Certificate in the Study of Spirituality. I am Cuban American because my family was born in Cuba and I was born and raised in Miami; although during vacations we would normally travel through the eastern states and go to New Jersey or Maine to visit relatives. So hopefully everything can work out, not only to gain insight of myself, but to eventually pass on that knowledge to future generations that would make more people capable of themselves to contributing to a better world.