She’s the pride of TNDC
You don’t have to be around TNDC very long to hear about Luisa Escobar. Little wonder, since her real life story puts Horatio Alger’s fiction to shame.

A few years ago, Luisa lived in a one room TNDC apartment with her El Salvadoran mother and two brothers. Today, at age 20, she is an outstanding history major at UCLA.

How did she do it? “It was hard,” she says with passion. “It was really hard on my mother. She makes very little money at Taco Bell. She was always under stress over bills and other things. But she’s very tenacious and has a lot of hope. She passed that on to me and my brothers.”

The family was referred to TNDC in 1990 greatly in need of affordable housing. They could not make ends meet where they were. Modest as the accommodations were, the new TNDC housing served as the foundation for Luisa’s future.

To hear Luisa tell it, her big break in life came when she was befriended by Yvette Robinson, TNDC Director of Tenant Services. “I met her at a tenants’ meeting when I was nine,” Luisa says. “She took an interest in me and was the light that shined my footsteps. She is a great friend and I was so lucky to find her.” Luisa and Yvette still keep in close contact.

“The Tenderloin After-School Program didn’t exist until I was 13,” Luisa says. “Until then our after school program was a two-bedroom apartment in Franciscan Towers where we played. Then Yvette proposed the program to the TNDC board and began fundraising with my brothers, other children and myself.” The program is a haven for kids after school, and offers tutoring, a play area, a computer room and other activities. It is also a much-needed service to working parents.

In another stroke of good fortune, Luisa was able to attend Mercy High School through the generosity of a TNDC donor. That educational opportunity laid the groundwork for her college career. She meets the UCLA $15,000 tuition with a combination of resources, a Pell grant, a Cal Grant B, work study, and an anonymous donor’s contribution from a foundation.

It comes as no surprise to learn that she works to help children of lowincome families in Los Angeles. After her schooling, she plans to work with kids with backgrounds like hers getting an MA in social welfare, and then a PhD in education. She will bring a wealth of personal experience to her chosen field that few social workers or teachers could match.

What of Luisa’s two brothers? Cesar Escobar, 21, is a scholarship student at Syracuse University. The youngest of the Escobars, Fernando, 17, has been admitted to UC Berkeley on scholarship.

What a proud mother Mrs. Loreina Escobar must be.