When Ismael was apply­ing for schol­ar­ships dur­ing his senior year of high school, he applied for rough­ly 40.

He heard back from one: Nation­al Rain­bow Col­lege Fund.

Ismael grew up in San Diego in a sin­gle-par­ent house­hold, so receiv­ing the schol­ar­ship was even more mean­ing­ful. After apply­ing for rough­ly 40 schol­ar­ships, NRCF was the only one he received. The fund­ing became an impor­tant part of the finan­cial assis­tance that helped him attend UCSB and gave him con­fi­dence that col­lege was finan­cial­ly with­in reach, with­out requir­ing him to be ful­ly out about his bisex­u­al­i­ty to receive it.

Today, Ismael is study­ing polit­i­cal sci­ence at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia, San­ta Bar­bara, with plans to attend law school and poten­tial­ly pur­sue a career in immi­gra­tion law.

His path to UCSB began years ear­li­er in a house­hold where mon­ey was tight. Raised by his moth­er along­side two sib­lings, Ismael under­stood that pay­ing for col­lege would require finan­cial aid and schol­ar­ships.

At the same time, he was nav­i­gat­ing anoth­er part of his life large­ly on his own terms.

Ismael began com­ing to terms with his bisex­u­al­i­ty dur­ing high school. In an envi­ron­ment where het­ero­sex­u­al­i­ty often felt assumed, sup­port­ive friends—including those he met through his school’s Gay Straight Alliance—gave him space to bet­ter under­stand and accept him­self.

He even­tu­al­ly came out to his moth­er and had a pos­i­tive expe­ri­ence. But not every­one in his fam­i­ly knew about his sex­u­al­i­ty, and he was aware that some rel­a­tives held homo­pho­bic views.

While Ismael was out to his moth­er and close friends, he wasn’t ful­ly out to every­one in his life, includ­ing mem­bers of his fam­i­ly.

A Scholarship That Didn’t Require Disclosure

Dur­ing his senior year, Ismael learned about Nation­al Rain­bow Col­lege Fund through AVID and decid­ed to apply.

What made the schol­ar­ship acces­si­ble to him was some­thing that can eas­i­ly be over­looked: he did not have to pub­licly dis­close or jus­ti­fy his iden­ti­ty in order to receive sup­port.

Look­ing back, Ismael said he like­ly would not have applied if receiv­ing the schol­ar­ship had required him to come out as bisex­u­al.

His expe­ri­ence reflects a real­i­ty for many LGBTQ+ stu­dents: being open about who you are is not always sim­ple, and safe­ty or fam­i­ly sup­port can­not always be assumed.

That is why pri­va­cy is foun­da­tion­al to the Nation­al Rain­bow Col­lege Fund’s schol­ar­ship mod­el. Stu­dents can seek sup­port with­out being asked to trade pri­va­cy for access to edu­ca­tion.

For Ismael, that design meant he could apply for help pay­ing for col­lege while decid­ing for him­self who knew about his sex­u­al­i­ty and when.

Making College Feel Possible

The schol­ar­ship became a mean­ing­ful part of the finan­cial assis­tance that allowed Ismael to attend UCSB. It also gave him greater con­fi­dence that col­lege was finan­cial­ly some­thing he could accom­plish.

For Ismael, what comes next may be law school.

Turning Experience Into a Future in Law

Ismael’s inter­est in immi­gra­tion law is per­son­al. His grand­moth­er’s expe­ri­ence going through immi­gra­tion court, along with encour­age­ment from a high school teacher, helped inspire him to pur­sue law. Today, his polit­i­cal sci­ence stud­ies at UCSB are lay­ing the ground­work for that goal.

Your sup­port helps more stu­dents like Ismael con­tin­ue their edu­ca­tion with­out hav­ing to choose between finan­cial sup­port and dis­clos­ing their iden­ti­ty.