Scholarship Lunch

Community leaders gathered at the Hilton for the annual Scholarship Foundation of Santa Barbara lunch.

The 56-year-old organization, which started giving $100 awards, this year awarded $8.32 million in scholarships to 2,260 students from across the county, bringing the total to a handsome $108 million to more than 50,000 college-bound youngsters over the past five decades, more than half of them first generation college students.

“College accessibility and affordability remains a challenge for local students and their families,” Don Logan, chairman of the foundation’s board, told the 350 guests.

Miguel Cruz, a Mexican immigrant student at CSU Channel Islands, whose father is a gardener and mother a cleaner, recounted growing up “angry, young, and poor,” selling drugs, losing his apartment, truck and custody of his daughter, and eventually trying to commit suicide before turning his life around, studying at City College and the University of London before graduating with a degree in psychology.

Janet Garufis, chairman of Montecito Bank & Trust, spoke as community leader, thanking her four-year scholarship at Loyola Marymount in Los Angeles for putting her on the career path to success.

Among the guests supporting the cause were new CEO Victoria Juarez, Susan Gulbransen, former mayor Helene Schneider, Jean Schuyler, Randy Weiss, Warren Staley, Maryan Schall, Luke Swetland, Nancy Schlosser, Sharol Siemens, Stan and Betty Hatch, Marybeth Carty, Joe Cole, Roger and Sarah Chrisman, Geoff Green, Dinah Calderon, Peter MacDougall, and Leslie Bhutani.