We need to convey to children: believe in yourself, and know that your community believes in you. And: we can prove it. That proof is visible all over the city this month: as more than 70,000 kindergartners receive their free NYC Scholarship Account. The accounts, via the NYC Kids RISE Save for College Program, are funded with an initial $100 allocation for every single kindergartner in a district or charter school, anywhere in New York City, in partnership with the NYC Department of Education and the NYC Mayor’s Office of Equity.

Money remains the biggest obstacle to college; it’s also among the easiest for wealthy New Yorkers to address. Research shows that establishing a college savings fund – even a small one – makes a huge difference in a child’s college prospects. A child with just a few hundred dollars in a college savings account is three times more likely to go to college, and four times more likely to graduate, than a child without an account.