Catalina Hernandez
Catalina transferred to UBalt from CCBC to earn her bachelor's degree in business. She is specializing in human relations.
Catalina Hernandez's parents taught her at a young age the value of a good education and she's never forgotten it.
"My parents tried to instill in me that education is very important. I work really hard for school because I think that's the way you have to make a difference," says Catalina, an international student working toward her B.S. in Business Administration at UBalt.
When the process gets hard, it's been her motivation all along.
"I'm proud of being here, studying here because it's not easy, but I put it together with my dream and someday, I'm going to graduate."
Catalina transferred to UBalt from the Community College of Baltimore County. She was interested in human resources, one of the specializations in UBalt's Business Administration program. She hopes to start a nonprofit business.
Catalina says she liked UBalt because she felt comfortable on the campus, compared to other colleges she visited.
"There's a huge diversity, so you can find people from everywhere," she says, adding that's becoming one of her favorite parts about UBalt. "I like finding people from all these different cultures, from Pakistan, from India, from Africa. ... It's really nice to be able to find someone raised in a different way, with a different culture, but you can still get along."
Some of the first friends Catalina made were her fellow Featherstone College Scholarship recipients. Each year, the William and Lanaea C. Featherstone Foundation makes scholarships available based on merit. UBalt is one of the foundation's partnering institutions. Receiving that scholarship was one of Catalina's best memories at UBalt.
"Going anywhere that's not your country, not your language, not your place, you're going to have to face a lot of challenges and one of the people at the ceremony was saying every time we accomplish one of our small goals, we're making a difference, we're making that difference to how others look at us."