By Cristina Arumbula
A few months ago, I was approached by the Santa Cruz County Branch of AAUW, the American Association of University Women, to share how my experience at Tech Trek has influenced me in my life so far. After some reflection, I was happy to share my journey because I believe that the week that I spent at Stanford 18 years ago has been integral to both my professional and interpersonal development.
I am the daughter of first-generation immigrants, and one of the first on either side of my family to graduate from college.
Applying, and being accepted to attend Tech Trek, came at a very pivotal time in my life.
I was 12 years old, I went through an interview and application process, and a group of educated women provided validation. I stayed in a Stanford dorm with three other girls, ate at dining halls, attended classes, and had workshops that introduced me to self-awareness.
We had many instructors, each introducing us to a field within the STEM disciplines — science, technology, engineering and mathematics — and I had a world of new career opportunities presented to me for the first time.
Cristina Arambula, second from left, with her husband Luis Arambula, her parents, Paula and Juan Diaz, at right, and Jane Amaral, long-standing AAUW Tech Trek committee member, center.
After attending Tech Trek, I was no longer wondering if I would be capable of going to college; college was from that point forward an inevitable certainty. I received my bachelor’s degree in accounting from Goshen College in Indiana.
I worked at a CPA firm before moving back home to California, and I now am an office manager at Granite Construction as well as the mentoring liaison for SOMOS Granite, an Employee Resource Group dedicated to enhancing the culture of inclusive diversity at Granite Construction.
I look forward to being able to contribute to the Santa Cruz branch of AAUW as a mentor to young women, and I will forever be grateful to AAUW and its members for the effect and impact that they have had in my life, and that of hundreds of other young girls.
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Tech Trek is a summer camp for middle school girls that focuses on STEM, science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
Campers spend one week on a university campus – they live in the dorms, eat in the cafeteria, attend labs and classes, and learn what it might be like to be a college student.
The Santa Cruz County branch of AAUW sponsors several girls annually. Together with other California branches, nearly 15,000 girls have attended Tech Trek since inception in 1998.
The Santa Cruz branch alone has sponsored more than 100 of them.
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Top Photo: Cristina Arambula, at right, with four girls who attended Tech Trek this past summer: Kamila Ruiz, Amira Parsons, Mariella Cruz and Mia Sanchez. It is a tradition to give the girls a teddy bear with a Tech Trek T-shirt; Cristina still has her red-shirted teddy bear from when she attended and AAUW gave her a blue-shirted bear at the luncheon.