Kindergarten to College Evaluation

About this grant

In August 2010, the city of San Francisco launched the Kindergarten to College program, a children’s savings account initiative that automatically opens college savings accounts for families when they enroll their children in a kindergarten class. Because the program provides an important opportunity to expand stakeholder understanding of good policy design for such initiatives, it is critical to evaluate, from the very early stages of implementation, the program’s impact on savings, children’s college aspirations, and parent and children’s financial capabilities. Through this grant, the Earned Assets Resource Network will employ multiple Kindergarten to College evaluation strategies to assess how effective the marketing has been in promoting the program; how effective the program design has been in encouraging follow-on contributions by participating parents from a wide range of socioeconomic and ethnic backgrounds; and what impact participation in the program has had on the financial capabilities of parents and on children’s college aspirations. Based in San Francisco, the grantee is dedicated to helping low-income families and individuals break the cycle of poverty and create new cycles of prosperity.