Arline Explains Why She Set Up a Scholarship Foundation at Santa Ana College

Santa Ana College provided a bridge to the life I wanted to live. It was 1971, and like many students today, I had to pay for my education myself. I lived on $1 a day and worked as a drive-up teller. I typed term papers, babysat for professors, and even worked the night shift at a mortuary. It was all I could do to work and study and get to classes.

Some days, when I was feeling sorry for myself, I’d go to the piano room at the college and play “The Impossible Dream.” It sounds corny now, but that’s really how it felt. My high school counselors hadn’t thought I would amount to much, but I was determined to prove them wrong. At the time, finishing college was my “impossible dream.”

Every once in a while, someone would come along and make me feel like my dream was a little less impossible. There was a custodian (whose name I wish I could remember) who would open the classroom with the baby grand pianos for me to play. It was such a little thing, but it made a big impact on me. There were a lot of little things like this along the way that gave me just the boost I needed to keep going.

It was while I was at Santa Ana College that I decided I wanted to be a teacher. I was going to teach all those little girls who were just like me that they could do anything they put their minds to.

Group photo people standing

After finishing my AA and transferring to California State University, Long Beach to get a teaching credential, I landed my dream job teaching 2nd grade at John Adams Elementary School. That job led to the creation of a bilingual educational TV show called El Mercado de los Numeros or “The Number Shop.” I wrote and hosted the show, which we eventually sold to KCET in Los Angeles. This led to more opportunities in the entertainment business and the rest, as they say, is history.

But the reason I give to Santa Ana College is not just because of the opportunities it provided me, but also because of my father.

My father was the third of five children born to a very poor, working class family. Even though he’d been forced to quit the 7th grade to work, my father recognized that education was the ticket to success in America. That’s why in 1950, at the age of 20, he and a group of friends decided to start a club that would raise funds for Santa Ana College student scholarships and promote the importance of higher education within the Hispanic community.

Over the years, the Gemini Club (the founders all had the same astrological birth sign) made it possible for hundreds of individuals to attend Santa Ana College. In 2001, to honor my father and continue his work, my husband and I started a scholarship fund for high-achieving Hispanic students majoring in Engineering, Biology, or Chemistry. Since then, we have given out over 170 scholarships totaling $470,000 to students who were accepted to a four-year institution but didn’t have the financial resources they needed to transfer and be successful.

But let me make something clear—my husband and I have not won the lottery. After starting several biotech companies, there were points where we had to remortgage the house to make ends meet. Things obviously turned around and we did okay, but it wasn’t without a lot of blood, sweat, and tears. We worked hard, and I expect the same from all of the students we support.

It’s been nice to see that there is no shortage of exceptional, hard-working students at Santa Ana College.

Today, the students we’ve supported have gone on to become doctors, engineers, scientists, and much more. Many of them still keep in touch, and seeing and sharing their success has been a real joy. It’s why I do this. I imagine it’s why my father did it, too.