Elena Escalona, a Cuban-American, is pursuing a master’s degree in bilingual childhood education at CCNY. Elena has worked for the Cuban-American National Council in Miami and interned in New York with SUNSGLOW: Global Training in the Rule of Law. In 2009, she served as the youth summit associate for the Interdependence Day Forum and Celebration 2009 in Istanbul, Turkey, with CivWorld. Elena currently volunteers at the International Center (ICNY) where she teaches conversational English to immigrants, refugees, students, and other newcomers to the U.S. She also works in the Adult Continuing Education Department for the CUNY Research Foundation and tutors bilingual New York public school students in English Language Arts and math for the Champion Learning Center. She started her undergraduate studies at Arizona State University as an NCAA Division I water polo player with All-American honors, before transferring to St. Francis College in Brooklyn. There, she majored in international cultural studies with a minor in fine arts. Elena also has studied intensive German as a non-degree student at Hunter College and attended the Berlin School of Economics and Law in Berlin, Germany, on an academic scholarship.  Bilingual education, she says, is truly her passion.