Cal Grant Modernization: Reforming an Inadequate System

In February of this year, the Cal Grant Reform Act, or AB-1456, was introduced in the California legislature by Assembly Members Medina and McCarty. The Act would modernize the Cal Grant, California’s postsecondary education grant aid program and what many consider to be an outdated and inadequate system. Among the host of criticisms for the program, the most pressing include inequitable eligibility requirements, based on arbitrary factors like age or time out of high school.

Cal Grant modernization, a proposal first explained by the California Student Aid Commission (CSAC) in their 2020 report, largely shaped the content of AB-1456. It would remove inequitable eligibility barriers and use a more comprehensive measure of student financial need–expanding access to aid for an estimated 280,000 students.

Currently, the Cal Grant serves almost 250,000 Californian college students. The Cal Grant is offered in three forms: A, B, and C. The three types of Cal Grants come in the form of either an entitlement or competitive award; a student receives one or the other depending on their eligibility. The entitlement award guarantees that the applicant will receive one of the Cal Grants, while a student who is ineligible for an entitlement award (for example, by not meeting the GPA or age requirement) may apply for one of the limited competitive Cal Grants.

The criteria for eligibility varies for each type of Cal Grant. High school students must have a 2.0 GPA to receive the Cal Grant A entitlement award, and a 3.0 to receive the Cal Grant B entitlement, while community college transfer applicants must have a 2.4 for Cal Grant C. High school applicants for an entitlement award are only eligible to apply the year they are graduating or the year after. On the other hand, community college transfer students must be under 28 years old to be eligible for an entitlement award, even though 28 is the median age of community college students nationally, and over 40 percent of community college students in California are 25 or over.

These current barriers to eligibility significantly disadvantage adult students with financial need. The average age of an eligible community college student denied a Competitive Cal Grant was 30. And since students over 28 aren’t eligible for entitlement Cal Grants, they’re left to fight over scarce funds for competitive grants. Fewer than one in twelve eligible Cal Grant applicants were able to receive a Competitive Cal Grant in the 2018-19 award year, even though they had financial need. Those are poor odds for adult students juggling multiple roles and trying to support their families while pursuing a credential.

The Cal Grant Reform Act would be a boon for adult community college students in California. In addition to getting rid of eligibility criteria that don’t reflect the student population, the current Cal Grant focuses on covering tuition costs for recipients, but for the many students facing an increasingly high cost of living in California, non-tuition costs pose a significant concern, which the Cal Grant fails to adequately cover. The Senate Committee’s bill analysis of the bill notes 7 out of 10 California students lost some income due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic has certainly thrown into sharp relief the difficulties students face when it comes to adequately funding their education–a burden that goes beyond tuition to housing, food, health care, and other basic needs. The Cal Grant 2 would more broadly base aid on a student’s total cost of attendance and would provide an “access award” meant to cover non-tuition costs for eligible community college students.

Proponents of Cal Grant modernization saw progress in the recently passed California state budget. Meanwhile, AB-1456 is still in the legislature, and was recently re-referred to the Senate Appropriations Committee. Other elements of the Cal Grant modernization proposal have yet to be implemented, but California students may see their state aid become more equitable and adequate for all who need it.

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