A philanthropic fable about a San Diego State student named Fabiola

Among the thousands of students graduating San Diego State this weekend is one of California’s most unlikely philanthropists.

I profiled Fabiola Moreno Ruelas, now 21, three summers ago, after meeting her in Gonzales, her hometown in the Salinas Valley. Her story was straightforward — but unforgettable.

Fabiola had few resources growing up. Her father was deported, her family was evicted from housing, and she and her mother relied on food stamps, and on neighbors’ donations of clothes and schoolbooks. She did well in school, but needed scholarships for tuition and living expenses — from Gonzales community members — to go to college.

As a teen, Fabiola was injured in a car accident — fracturing her skull, wrist, and back. But that accident would improve her fortunes. At 18, she received a $29,000 settlement.

Then she made a remarkable choice. Rather than spend the money on herself o family, she started her own scholarship fund, the Ruelas Fulfillment Foundation, to give back to Gonzales. She launched with $500 grants to four Gonzales kids to cover college living expenses.

After I met Fabiola in summer 2019, she returned to San Diego for her sophomore year. Dropout rates are high for first-generation college students from less-advantaged families. She says she found university difficult during her freshman year, and that she had contemplated leaving school.

In the end, her instinct for giving would see her through.

But it wasn’t easy. In her sophomore fall, the academic demands grew, and she juggled two and three jobs to afford to stay in school. Then, early in 2020, she suffered two personal blows. In January, she got the tragic news that her father had died in Mexico. Just weeks later, her stepfather got hit by a big rig while riding a bicycle and suffered near-fatal head injuries.

As Fabiola processed those hardships, COVID hit. She was a student resident advisor in a dorm — so when campus shut, she lost her place to live and a job. She went home, to more grief. COVID fatality rates were high in the Salinas Valley in 2020. She felt isolated.

“At that point, I really did feel like I lost everything,” Fabiola tells me. “I was grieving my father and then my stepfather … I was grieving my [student] residents.”

She says she found purpose, and comfort, in giving away money. She funded three more students through her scholarship fund. During the George Floyd-inspired protests that summer, she gave $1,000 from her fund to the NAACP chapter at San Diego State.

She stayed enrolled in school, virtually, and soon found online work, mentoring other first-generation low-income students. She got a boost from emergency federal payments to college students, though she was outraged that students without legal immigration status weren’t eligible. So, in January 2021, she made two more grants to undocumented students, both at San Diego State. When she was down, one grantee — an engineering student — gave her a pep talk.

Between work and studying political science, she found time to serve in student organizations, including as vice president of systemwide affairs for the California State Student Association, student diversity commissioner for Associated Students and on the Educational Opportunity Program advisory board.

Graduating, she says, feels more like beginning than end. She’s not just the first college graduate in her family. She managed, barely, to graduate without debt. That will make it easier to do what she really wants: give away more money. All told, Fabiola has now given scholarships to 12 students from Gonzales High School, plus the undocumented students’ grants.

She may make a wider impact, too, since the governor put her on his vision council for reimagining post-secondary education. While she isn’t sure what’s next, she can raise money, and has first-hand experience in increasing education access.

Perhaps she should become Cal State chancellor, she muses.

The job is open.

Joe Mathews writes the Connecting California column for Zócalo Public Square.

This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: A philanthropic fable about a San Diego State student named Fabiola