Finding Purpose Through Community Service

June 18, 2025 | By NRCF Vol­un­teer

 Hei Fok: NRCF Vol­un­teer Spot­light

Nation­al Rain­bow Col­lege Fund (NRCF) is ded­i­cat­ed to advanc­ing edu­ca­tion­al equi­ty for LGBTQ+ stu­dents, many of whom face unique bar­ri­ers to access­ing and com­plet­ing high­er edu­ca­tion. Through schol­ar­ships, men­tor­ship, and vol­un­teer engage­ment, NRCF fos­ters a pow­er­ful com­mu­ni­ty of sup­port for stu­dents.

One such vol­un­teer is Hei Fok, Sacra­men­to State PRIDE Cen­ter Coor­di­na­tor and long­time advo­cate for equi­ty in edu­ca­tion. Hei brings more than just his time—he brings lived expe­ri­ence, per­spec­tive, and a pow­er­ful com­mit­ment to vis­i­bil­i­ty.

“Being gay was not accept­ed where I was born and raised. In Hong Kong, even as a child, I remem­ber feel­ing like I was dif­fer­ent. What strikes me most is that even before I knew about the con­cept of sex­u­al­i­ty or the ter­mi­nol­o­gy involved, I knew there was some­thing dif­fer­ent about me,” reflects Hei Fok, Sacra­men­to State PRIDE Cen­ter Coor­di­na­tor and ded­i­cat­ed NRCF vol­un­teer.

The weight of that dif­fer­ence fol­lowed him through his for­ma­tive years. “By the time I was in high school, I had acquired the lan­guage to describe my feel­ings. I knew I was gay. When I was grow­ing up in the sev­en­ties and eight­ies, mass media and soci­ety as a whole had lit­tle to no rep­re­sen­ta­tion of gay peo­ple – and what did exist was not par­tic­u­lar­ly accu­rate for many. I knew I had to hide my true self.”

A Jour­ney to Authen­tic­i­ty

At 21, Hei arrived in the Unit­ed States to attend col­lege in Sacramento—a deci­sion that would fun­da­men­tal­ly change his life’s tra­jec­to­ry. “Pock­ets of peo­ple showed me they were far more accept­ing than what I had access to in the past,” he recalls of those ear­ly days. “Over time, I grad­u­al­ly came out to more and more peo­ple after being here. I felt safe, or safe enough, with­in that envi­ron­ment. So, I stayed and built a career path in high­er edu­ca­tion.”

For two decades, Hei devot­ed him­self to sup­port­ing stu­dents in con­tin­u­ing edu­ca­tion, find­ing ful­fill­ment in help­ing oth­ers nav­i­gate their aca­d­e­m­ic jour­neys. But it was­n’t until the pan­dem­ic struck that he felt called to make more of a direct impact on the LGBTQ+ com­mu­ni­ty.

A Pan­dem­ic Awak­en­ing

“I was out to the peo­ple around me and mar­ried to a man, but I had­n’t real­ly ever been that active in the com­mu­ni­ty,” Hei admits. “COVID changed so much of every­day life for every­one. I rec­og­nized how priv­i­leged and for­tu­nate I was dur­ing that intense time. I was­n’t sig­nif­i­cant­ly impact­ed, but many of my peers were, and it inspired me to try some­thing dif­fer­ent before retir­ing.”

When the Sacra­men­to State PRIDE Cen­ter coor­di­na­tor posi­tion opened, Hei felt an imme­di­ate call­ing. The job post­ing awak­ened some­thing he’d car­ried for decades—a won­der­ing about work­ing direct­ly with the queer com­mu­ni­ty. Near­ly a year into the role, he’s found his pro­fes­sion­al call­ing inter­sect­ing mean­ing­ful­ly with his per­son­al mis­sion.

The Pow­er of Rep­re­sen­ta­tion

“It is new for me to work in the queer space as a pro­fes­sion­al, and vol­un­teer­ing as a NRCF schol­ar­ship appli­ca­tion essay review­er has been a won­der­ful way to also give back,” Hei explains. “Read­ing the stu­dents’ state­ments remind­ed me of how impor­tant it is to have rep­re­sen­ta­tion. Vis­i­bil­i­ty and oppor­tu­ni­ty for our com­mu­ni­ty are crit­i­cal, espe­cial­ly with the cur­rent polit­i­cal cli­mate.”

His work has opened his eyes to gaps that still need to be bridged. He’s par­tic­u­lar­ly con­cerned about stu­dents of Latin Amer­i­can her­itage who aren’t access­ing PRIDE Cen­ter resources due to cul­tur­al and fam­i­ly pressures—a reminder that inter­sec­tion­al­i­ty requires inten­tion­al out­reach and under­stand­ing.

Queer Love Is Here to Stay

At the PRIDE Cen­ter, Hei has anchored his work around an inspir­ing theme: “Queer love is here to stay. Togeth­er, we can val­i­date the exis­tence of LGBTQ+ indi­vid­u­als and com­mu­ni­ty. The dan­ger is that peo­ple can think to them­selves that if they don’t see us, then we don’t exist. Queer peo­ple have always exist­ed and will always exist.”

His phi­los­o­phy cen­ters on con­nec­tion over divi­sion. “Let’s empha­size love over hate. We should be sup­port­ing peo­ple, not divid­ing them. We can strength­en our abil­i­ty to be resilient. We are here to stay—no mat­ter what hap­pens. Vol­un­teer­ing at NRCF is a good way for me to focus my time and effort in the fight for equal­i­ty.”

Look­ing For­ward

Through his essay review work with NRCF, Hei has gained insight into the next gen­er­a­tion of LGBTQ+ advo­cates. “I recall a num­ber of stu­dents who might not yet real­ize the huge impor­tance of describ­ing them­selves ful­ly due to how young they are at this inflec­tion point in their lives. It’s the fun­da­men­tal impor­tance of self-advo­ca­cy that inter­twines with the larg­er aspect of equi­ty.”

His expe­ri­ence has rein­forced a truth he’s learned over time: “As we get old­er, we start to see how impor­tant it is to speak up and out for our­selves. I hope that as my work at the PRIDE Cen­ter evolves, I can find new and inno­v­a­tive ways to reach stu­dents who aren’t com­ing in per­son and to let them know we are here for you.”

From a young man hid­ing his true self in Hong Kong to a pro­fes­sion­al advo­cate cre­at­ing safe spaces for the next gen­er­a­tion, Hei Fok’s jour­ney embod­ies the trans­for­ma­tive pow­er of com­mu­ni­ty, accep­tance, and ser­vice. Through his vol­un­teer work with NRCF and his role at Sacra­men­to State, he con­tin­ues to build bridges of under­stand­ing while ensur­ing that queer love—and queer people—remain vis­i­ble, val­ued and here to stay.

Want to Make a Dif­fer­ence?

Here’s how you can sup­port LGBTQ+ stu­dents:

Every action counts — thank you for being part of this move­ment for edu­ca­tion­al equi­ty and oppor­tu­ni­ty. No LGBTQ+ stu­dent should ever have to choose between their safe­ty and their edu­ca­tion­al dreams.