Anytime Angela "Angie" Gomez is talked about by her family, it is always in the present tense. Even eight months after her life was cut short.
The 20-year-old was one of 58 people killed at the Route 91 Harvest Festival in Las Vegas on October 1, 2017. She attended the country music festival with her high school sweetheart, Ethan Sanchez. Angie Gomez was struck twice by high caliber rounds and carried to safety by Sanchez and a group of strangers.
She died minutes later at a Las Vegas hospital.
"I try to keep it in present tense because it's hard in past tense," Sanchez said. "Like who she [Angie] was and who she's meant to be, it's not over. Her story is continuing."
Now nearly one year after the Las Vegas massacre, her story is continuing through The Angela C. Gomez Memorial Foundation. The foundation was established by Gomez's friends and family, with the mission to "give hope and inspire dreams through scholarships and fundraisers which promote some of the causes Angela was passionate about."
Julie Gomez, her mother, called the scholarships a "way to carry on her memory and a way to inspire kindness in others."
The scholarships will be given out on an annual basis to students at Riverside Poly High School and Riverside City College, both of which Angie Gomez attended.
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The Poly High School scholarship goes to a senior who is a student athlete and who exemplifies the "kindness and compassion" that Angie Gomez did.
That scholarship was awarded last week to Kate Santoso, a UCLA-bound senior.
"We didn't know her [Kate] before but we had a lot of scholarship applicants to choose from," Julie Gomez said. "Hers stood out because she's a role model and kind, compassionate and caring to everyone she meets. That's what we are trying to do, spread love and kindness in the world after what happened to our daughter."
Angie Gomez, who was studying to be a pediatric nurse, was "on the right track to start her life and her dreams," Sanchez recalled.
"We want Kate to fulfill her dreams like Angela would have."
The memorial foundation is also offering a scholarship to one or two nursing students at Riverside City College.
"No matter what success or good or positive light that come out of this foundation, none of it will ever amount to having Angela here," Sanchez said. "I would trade it all for her. I do hope the work the foundation plans to do makes everyone hurt less."
The Angela C. Gomez Foundation will be hosting fundraisers and providing endowments for Poly High School programs throughout the year, her family said.
