Nicole Marie Rodriguez, RN, BSN

The professors at FIU Nursing were amazing. There was never any judgment, and I never felt like I was being belittled or that my questions were dumb. FIU Nursing was a very nurturing environment, and everybody helped each other. I loved the program. After I graduated, I felt very confident to care for my patients, and I felt very confident to succeed and give back to my community. My education and my clinical education made me a better person. It made me more patient, more open-minded, and more understanding. It helped me to not be so quick to judge and understand all of the different walks of life that people came from. Because I made connections with the FIU Nursing faculty, I was able to get the advice that I needed to determine what I wanted to do for higher education. I was also able to go back to FIU and work at the STAR Center. Then I was able to work at the Nicklaus Children's Hospital for a few years because of the connections I made while working at the STAR Center. I was always able to ask for advice, and the FIU Nursing faculty were always very willing to provide that information, help me succeed, and connect me with resources if they could. The community at FIU was all about helping others and building people up to succeed, which was really nice.