Celeste Molina

Celeste Molina is a college student at the University of Texas at Austin, where she is pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations and Global Studies with an expected graduation in May 2028. She studies Arabic at UT and will begin studying Persian in the upcoming fall. In addition to her academic pursuits, Celeste teaches English to girls based in Afghanistan for approximately 12 weeks through Ottawa Kabul Global Education and volunteers frequently with the UT Austin Refugee Mentorship Program. Her extracurricular activities include significant involvement in Democracy in High School during her high school years and participation in the online Teenage Girl Cabal group. She recently attended a conference in Minneapolis on high-performance computing and studied abroad in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina in May. Celeste enjoys listening to Arabic and Persian music, writing novels, reading books including memoirs of resilient women, spending time with family and friends, and watching content on geopolitics and true crime. She attributes her drive and empowerment to a warm and supportive family, particularly her mother who encourages her confidence, quality friendships, critical thinking that fosters agency, and the process of writing a novel featuring a strong main character inspired by figures like Xena Warrior Princess, all while aspiring to live a life that her future daughter would view with pride.