On Wednesday, January 31, U.S. Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania introduced federal legislation to create a national children’s account policy. The 401Kids Act is designed to empower all children, and particularly children from disadvantaged households, by providing a means for them to accumulate assets for developmental priorities like higher education.
A new study captures parents’ perspectives on the influence that Child Development Accounts can exert over children’s educational attainment and parental saving for children’s higher education. Successful policymaking depends on public support. In policies affecting children, parents’ understanding and opinions matter. A new study from Center for Social Development researchers Jin Huang, Sondra G. Beverly, […]
Brown School honors Clancy with 2023 Distinguished Alumni Award Passion and patience. Margaret Clancy has devoted a generous dose of each during her 24-year career with the Center for Social Development (CSD) in the Brown School at Washington University in St. Louis. They have paid off not only for her career, but for millions of […]
The state enrolls 3.4 million children in CalKIDs, which CSD experts helped to shape. Today Governor Gavin Newsom publicly launched CalKIDS, the California Kids Investment and Development Savings program. With 3.4 million children in the first cohort of enrollees and more than $1.8 billion in assets, CalKIDS leaves the starting gate as the nation’s largest […]
New research from the Center for Social Development shows that a children’s account policy reduces obstacles to higher education. As the cost of higher education continues to grow, families in the United States struggle to save enough for children’s education. State 529 college savings plans are investment vehicles that assist families in meeting this need, […]
What would it take to ensure that every child in every state has an account accumulating assets for education beyond high school? How would those assets shape the children and their families? State officials, researchers, nonprofit leaders, program managers, and funders gathered July 16 to take up those questions.
Thirteen years after they began, researchers in a landmark study of asset building in Oklahoma are poised to receive new information gathered despite obstacles posed by COVID-19.
The report summarizes findings and recommendations from CDA research to inform policymakers and practitioners operating or considering CDAs in the midst of the COVID-19 health and economic crisis.
A study from the Center for Social Development’s SEED for Oklahoma Kids (SEED OK) experiment has been nominated for an award given to the best paper published in the Journal of Consumer Affairs.
CSD research and expertise shape proposal for a universal policy in the Show-Me state.
An expanding partnership is pursuing legislation for Missouri children in 2020.
Amendments enacted on Wednesday, October 2, will affect all newborn children in California. The state became the third this year to adopt a universal, at-birth Child Development Account (CDA) policy.
Illinois became the most recent state in the U.S. to adopt universal Child Development Accounts on August 23, when Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed legislation to open a 529 college savings plan account with deposits for every child born or adopted in Illinois after Dec. 31, 2020.
Nebraska’s legislature today approved a universal Child Development Account (CDA) policy that will cover every resident born in the state on or after January 1, 2020.
With financial support from philanthropists, the Center for Social Development is conducting a third wave of research on Child Development Accounts (CDAs) in the Oklahoma 529 College Savings Plan. Wave 3 of the SEED for Oklahoma Kids (SEED OK) experiment expands the original CDA with an automatic, progressive deposit and extends the research to examine […]
Center for Social Development Policy Director Margaret Clancy testified Tuesday before the Nebraska Legislature’s Education Committee. The subject: Child Development Account policy and research results.
More than 65 invited guests from 18 states and the District of Columbia attended a lively Child Development Account Forum in late July at the Brown School of Social Work. CSD and Missouri State Treasurer Eric Schmitt, who oversees Missouri’s 529 college savings plan, hosted the event.
With bipartisan support, Pennsylvania is launching a statewide policy to provide college savings accounts for all newborns with a $100 scholarship grant. The universal, automatic-enrollment Child Development Account policy will affect many families: Pennsylvania averages 140,000 births a year.
A national Child Development Account policy is emerging in Taiwan. President Tsai Ing-wen in June signed into law the Act on Savings Accounts for the Education and Development of Children and Teenagers.
About 50 researchers, practitioners, policymakers and funders met this month in Washington, D.C., to discuss how to advance the field of Child Development Account programs by making them sustainable and scaleable to reach millions.
A new CSD brief aims to advance Child Development Account policy by identifying 10 elements for universal and progressive CDAs at scale.
Four states have created statewide Child Development Account policies, and a new report describes them in detail with the intent of informing new initiatives in the United States.
The ScholarShare Investment Board, which oversees California’s 529 college savings plan, will administer the program. Margaret Clancy, policy director at the Center for Social Development, serves on ScholarShare’s Matching Grant Program Advisory Committee.
Newly elected Missouri State Treasurer Eric Schmitt kicked off the June 20 Child Development Account Forum by saying his office is “very focused” on the Missouri MOST 529 College Savings Plan.
Financial Capability and Asset Building for All is one of the 12 Grand Challenges for Social Work and a growing practice in the social work profession. The Center for Social Development is committed to working with its partners to increase the financial capability of individuals, families, and communities across the globe!
Parents’ savings and assets are unlikely to jeopardize federal or state need-based aid for low- and moderate-income dependent college students, according to a new policy brief from the Center for Social Development.
Michal Grinstein-Weiss, associate director of the Center for Social Development, spent part of December with Israel’s leading media providing insight on the country’s new law creating Child Development Accounts, the Savings for Every Child law.
The mayor of New York has announced a new child savings account to help thousands of New York City public school children save for college. City officials relied on research from the Center for Social Development to develop the three-year pilot program, which starts next fall.
“Financial capability and asset building” is the theme of the 60th anniversary issue of Social Work. Articles by several researchers at the Center for Social Development were published in the October 2016 issue of the flagship journal of the National Association of Social Workers.
Social Security provides an important base of income, and without it about 50 percent of America’s elderly would live in poverty, said David Certner, legislative counsel and legislative policy director for government affairs at AARP.
On August 18, the Center for Social Development received the College Kids Ambassador Award from the St. Louis Treasurer’s Office of Financial Empowerment.
More than 60 people from 10 states and the District of Columbia participated in the “Child Development Account Forum” on August 16 at the Brown School.
Building on a longtime working history, leadership from the Center for Social Development formally advised the Israeli government in May on best practices for implementing the country’s new law to confer universal savings accounts on children born in Israel. The law takes effect in January 2017.
Families’ costs have decreased for Missouri’s MOST 529 college savings plan, and now there is no minimum deposit required to open an account.
Every student in public, private and home schools in Salem City, N.J., will have access to a seed deposit in a 529 college savings account starting in April, officials announced.
An ambitious call to action on pressing social problems in America was issued January 14 at the Society for Social Work and Research annual conference in Washington, D.C.
Michal Grinstein-Weiss, associate director of the Center for Social Development, spent part of December traveling in Israel on an important mission: to spread the word about how Israel can best implement its new law to provide universal child savings accounts known in the United States as Child Development Accounts, to all newborns.
Every kindergartner enrolled this year in St. Louis City public and charter schools is receiving a college savings account, Treasurer Tishaura O. Jones said at the official launch of the College Kids program.
Israel’s parliament has passed a law funding long-term savings accounts for all newborns, based on a proposal developed by Michal Grinstein-Weiss, associate director of the Center for Social Development, and on research efforts led by Michael Sherraden, director of CSD.
More than 100 people gathered in St. Louis in October to hear leading experts discuss the latest research, funding, program and account-structure ideas in the growing field of Child Development Accounts.
The Ferguson Commission in its report released this week called for universal Child Development Accounts that are statewide and automatic.
At the Center for Social Development, we believe that financial security should be lifelong, starting at birth and extending from childhood through adulthood. Today CSD is proud to join CFED and more than a dozen other partners in launching the Campaign for Every Kid’s Future.
In the United States, the largest Child Development Account (CDA) programs have been built on existing college savings plans, often called 529 plans after the relevant section of the Internal Revenue Code.
Rhode Island’s treasurer and governor-elect, Gina M. Raimondo, on Dec. 10 announced a policy change to make college savings more accessible for newborn children in that state. In January, it will be as simple as checking a box.
An experiment that models the first truly universal Child Development Account policy in the United States shows early positive impacts for parents and children, according to a research summary recently published by the Center for Social Development at Washington University in St. Louis.
The Center for Social Development at Washington University in St. Louis built on an already engaged and productive relationship this month when it co-sponsored a symposium with the Center for Household Financial Stability at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.
This week, the state of Maine became the first in the United States to make college savings for newborns universal and automatic, putting into practice research pioneered by Michael Sherraden and the Brown School’s Center for Social Development at Washington University in St. Louis.
A college savings account in a child’s name not only gives parents hope for the future, it also results in improved social-emotional health for their children.
When every dollar is spent on necessities like diapers, gasoline and utilities, saving for college may be the furthest thing from a new parent’s mind. Mothers participating in a research study, however, suggest that a college savings account with $1,000 makes them feel optimistic about their children’s postsecondary education.
State-sponsored college savings plans, often called 529 plans, offer tax incentives to facilitate saving for postsecondary education. Low- and moderate-income families are less likely to have college savings than higher-income families.