Soraya Sussman was born in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, and moved with her parents to Freeport, Long Island at the age of three. In her later years, Soraya moved to Queens, where she has been a dedicated community activist for over 35 years. She worked closely with the late State Senator Jose P. Peralta. She holds a Master of Public Administration from Baruch College and a Master of Health Care Quality from George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Throughout her distinguished 30-year career in healthcare, she has held leadership positions ranging from Associate Director to Vice President of Practice Transformation.

In 2018, she completed the Film & Television Production Course program at Manhattan Neighborhood Network El Barrio Firehouse Community Media Center. In 2019, she attended the HB Studio Theatrical Producing Course and co-founded MARLEX Films, LLC, which produced three short films: Xtra Dirty, Let Me Down, and Don’t Put Me on Hold, Please. That same year, she co-wrote Stygian Fields, a full-length film script currently in pre-production development. In 2020, she completed the Scriptwriting course at Voices of America NY Workshop – The Playground Experiment Group.

In 2023, Soraya co-founded The Company We Keep Theatre Productions (TCWKTP), a Queens-based theatre company run by an all-Latina collective. That same year, she co-founded the performing arts nonprofit The AreitoTaino Group, Corp., in Queens, NY. The AreitoTaino Group has established two programs: the Youth Playwriting Program and The Copyright/Entertainment Law Workshops, which will be launched in summer 2026 in Queens, NY.

In 2025, Soraya presented a developmental reading of her original play, Ice Factory, in Queens, NY, and graduated from the TRU Resource Theatre Foundation Production Program in New York. In Spring 2026, she was selected to participate in the Museum of Art and Origins (MoAO) HueArts Leadership Cohort. She is currently working toward an Equity industry reading of Ice Factory, scheduled for Summer 2026.