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Ken and Moira Feingold at the inaugural Scholarship Benefit Dinner.

Moira and Ken were instrumental in establishing the Santa Monica High School Scholarship, an endowed fund that provides support to a Santa Monica student entering UC Santa Cruz. The demographic profile of Santa Monica High School is typically urban: approximately 6 percent Asian, 27 percent Hispanic/Latino, 8 percent African American, and 58 percent white. Each year approximately 20 Santa Monica High School graduates enter UC Santa Cruz. “As the gap between rich and poor gets bigger and bigger, the kids who are the future of California are going to have a harder and harder time getting to college,” said Moira. “We think they deserve the kind of opportunity we had.”

Moira, a health care consultant, and Ken, a lawyer, met as students at UC Santa Cruz, and each has a sibling who is also a UC Santa Cruz graduate. “We’ve seen UC Santa Cruz grow and mature into a fuller, better campus, offering opportunity to everybody,” said Ken. They were impressed by the enthusiasm of the College Nine and College Ten students they met at the colleges’ joint dedication ceremonies. “They are the pioneer class for those colleges, and they are living the dream that UCSC was founded on,” said Ken. “They showed us that that dream is still alive.”

As volunteers for student outreach in the Los Angeles area, Moira and Ken have an opportunity to share their perspective on UC Santa Cruz with prospective students and their parents. Said Ken, “It’s a great place to discover oneself, to learn among friends, to be stimulated by a great, diverse faculty, and to be at one of the most beautiful campuses in the U.S.”