BERKELEY, Calif. (KGO) — Like millions of high school students around the country, when the time came for Elliott Turner to go to college, financing was an important consideration.
Turner ultimately ended up at UC Berkeley, an academic achievement he's paying for in part thanks to the National Rainbow College Fund.
"I haven't really had to be concerned about what my financial stability will look like when I'm here. And it's given me a lot of freedom to just be concerned with my education," Turner said.
The fund is a first-of-its-kind organization that offers scholarship money to LGBTQ students.
Its goal is to provide a means for queer students to achieve their academic dreams regardless if they're out of the closet or not.
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The fund's manager, Rogelio Espinoza, says data shows LGBTQ students traditionally get less scholarship money than their straight counterparts.
"And that's for multiple factors and reasons," Espinoza said. "One of those can be that some of these students unfortunately, do not receive family support. Because they have either come out to their family and they've recieved family rejection. Or, they have just not told their family about their status."
The fund is currently only available for students based in California.
But, in the future, that could change.
The organization tells ABC7 News that one day, they'd like to be a national entity helping students around the U.S.
Espinoza says the fund helped 40 students this academic year.
That number will grow to 200 this coming fall.
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"This scholarship is truly making an impact. And we're hoping that, even if it's one scholarship that this small amount of support can really allow the student to focus on their education and achieve their academic dreams," Espinoza said.
Turner is thankful to have been chosen in the fund's initial batch of recipients.
He says once he graduates, he hopes to help others get the same assistance he's gotten.
"I always want to see people from my community succeed, and so as I'm leaving college in the next few years, I couldn't see myself not giving back to the community that helped me get here," Turner said.
The fund is planning to increase its fundraising efforts to try and help as many students as possible moving forward.
