CADAA Estudiante Cuenta: The Effects of the California Dream Act Application on Undocumented Student Success

The California Dream Act and CADAA opened access to state Cal Grants for undocumented students who cannot receive federal aid. Using the universe of CADAA applications, this study employs a regression discontinuity design around annual Cal Grant offer cutoffs to estimate intention-to-treat effects of scoring above the threshold on educational outcomes. A fuzzy RDD uses score-relative-to-cutoff as an instrument for actual grant receipt to estimate local average treatment effects. Preliminary evidence suggests that receiving a Cal Grant through CADAA increases undocumented students’ access to higher education and integration into California’s colleges. The project provides causal evidence on how state financial aid policies shape college access for undocumented youth.