Michelle Obama has become one of the most influential first ladies in American history. She has had many accomplishments, such as inspiring companies like Walgreens and Walmart to build or expand 1,500 stores in communities with limited or no access to food and launching Let Girls Learn, a U.S. government-wide initiative to help girls around the world have access to an education and stay in school. Her evident love for not only for her family but the nation itself was another contributing factor to her legacy, along with being the first lady of the United States for eight years without a single scandal. She had an impact on our country and will never be forgotten, even if she’s no longer in office.

Now we have Melania Trump, who has been relatively quiet and out of the spotlight even when the election was ongoing. It could be said that we know very little about her, besides the fact that she had come from the communist country of Yugoslavia, which had broken up in 1992 and became the countries Serbia, Montenegro, Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, and Kosovo. She is a successful entrepreneur, owning a fashion jewelry line and a skincare line. She also has obvious devotion to her husband from the very few interviews that she has participated in as well. But the thing that the American people are asking about is what Melania plans to do during her time as the first lady.

The first lady is not paid. At all. She’s basically hostess of the White House, and only carries out ceremonial titles and duties. However, she is given a budget to buy her own clothes, pay her staff, transportation, and lodging when she’s travelling to promote causes. To put it shortly, Melania isn’t really obligated to actually do anything if she doesn’t want to.

Michelle was well-known for her persistence for children to have access to healthy food and good education, as well as promoting exercise. Melania’s plan so far is to focus on cyber bullying among young people of our generation. Some may say it’s not exactly something the nation should care about, even though cyber bullying is an actual problem amid our generation–87 percent of today’s youth have witnessed cyberbullying. With that information, it’s clear that Melania’s plan holds some weight.

She is in the center of controversy, though. Supporting her husband’s comments that qualified as sexual harassment and allegedly plagiarising Michelle Obama’s speech at the Republican National Convention have been few of the reasons why she is not very well-liked among the people. Her actions do not excuse her from criticism, but there is a very bold line between criticism and harassment.

In order for Melania to leave as big of an impact as Michelle did before her, she must defend herself in her own words, with fearlessness and no remorse. She must be as outspoken and never back down. Hiding behind a wall is not what will benefit her during the four years she will be in office, and she must learn that before it’s too late. She must reach out to the community and connect instead of reading it off of paper. She must speak and act from her heart.

Melania is in New York with her son to help him with his education, so we can’t expect much of her yet. Instead, we’ll have to wait and see what the future has in store for us and what Melania will do in that span of time.