The California Kids Investment and Development Savings Program (CalKIDS) provides young people with a jumpstart in affording to pursue college and career training by automatically offering scholarships of up to $1,5000 to eligible public school students and all Californians born on or after July 1, 2022.
On March 5, it was announced that CalKIDS, the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office and the California Cradle-to-Career Data System had launched a coordinated effort to assist community college students in accessing their scholarships.
“Through this partnership, state education leaders are leveraging existing student data systems to help community colleges pinpoint enrolled students who have CalKIDS Scholarships available to claim and use,” according to a press release from the State Treasurer’s Office. “The effort identified 40,000 community college students with approximately $20 million in CalKIDS Scholarships available. These insights will strengthen targeted, campus-level outreach to connect students with those funds for qualified educational expenses.”
State Treasurer Fiona Ma serves as chair for CalKIDS, which is administered by the ScholarShare Investment Board (a state agency).
The scholarship funds can be used for qualified education-related expenses like tuition and fees, books and supplies and computer equipment.
“This partnership reflects California’s commitment to ensuring that students can access the opportunities already available to them,” Ma said in a statement. “Through CalKIDS, we are investing in students long before they arrive on a college campus, and this effort helps ensure those scholarships are actually reaching the students who need them most.”
According to the CalKIDS 2025 media kit, 60 percent of the state’s public school students in grades 2-12 are eligible to claim a CalKIDS scholarship. No essays, recommendation letters or grade point average requirements are barriers and students can claim their scholarships in minutes via the CalKIDS website by using their Statewide Student Identifier, which appears on their high school transcript or can be pulled by their former high school. Funds can be used until an individual is age 26.
According to research, students with even modest savings for higher education are three times more likely to go to college and four times more likely to graduate.
As of June 2025, $2 billion has been invested in CalKIDS scholarships with $53 million distributed to almost 100,000 students to pursue college or career training.
What LEAs can do
According to an April 2025 fact sheet from the Public Policy Institute of California, high school graduates are more likely to enroll within the California Community Colleges System than directly into four-year public systems.
Knowing they have a scholarship before they exit the K-12 system can help ease financial burdens and encourage students to embrace their dreams.
Local educational agencies can be a partner in spreading the word to families and students about the CalKIDS scholarships through available marketing tools to ensure they claim and use the money to support the next generation of Californians.
