CalFresh Student Eligibility
The following questions were asked in regards to criteria laid out by the CalFresh Requirements. This includes U.S. citizenship (or lawful permanent resident), receiving Cal Grant A/B, and receiving food from a campus meal plan. Household size and monthly income is also looked at and broken down into a chart to show CalFresh eligibility. Students were also determined to be eligible or not for CalFresh based on their responses to these criteria questions.
CalFresh Criteria
Below are a series of Yes/No questions asked in order to help determine if a person is potentially eligible for CalFresh benefits.| Yes (%) | |
|---|---|
| Are you a U.S. citizen (n = 380)? | 348 (91.6%) |
| I received Cal Grant A or B (n = 322)? | 282 (87.6%) |
| I was approved for “work study” even though I may not actually have a work study job placement (n = 277)? | 192 (69.3%) |
| If not a U.S. citizen, are you a lawful permanent resident (i.e. have a ‘green card’) (n = 32)? | 21 (65.6%) |
| Are you on a campus meal plan (n = 378)? | 6 (1.6%) |
Of the participants in the survey 348 claim to be U.S. citizens and 32 claim to not be U.S. Citizens. For people who were not, 21 people claim to be a lawful permanent residents and 11 people claim to not be a lawful permanent residents. There are 85 people who claim not to be approved for work study and 192 claim to be approved for work study. There are 40 students who do not receive Cal Grant A or B (composing 12.4% of the data), and 282 students who do receive Cal Grant A or B. The majority of people in the data (372 people) do not receive any meals from a Campus Meal Plan and the 372 people that are on a Campus Meal Plan claim the following assistance below:
Meals Per Week
How many meals per week do you get on your meal plan? (n=5, 1% of 407 reporting).
Figure 5.1: Meals Per Week from Meal Plan
3 people get more than 11 meals per week from Campus Meal Plans, while 2 people get less than 11 meals per week from a Campus Meal Plan.
Household Size & Income
The following two questions were asked about household size and monthly income, which were then combined into a single plot:
- How many people in your household do you purchase and prepare food with, including yourself? This may or may not include your roommate(s). (n=356, 87% of 407 reporting).
- How much is your household’s gross monthly income (before taxes and not including financial aid)? (n=322, 79% of 407 reporting).
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $150 or less | 24 | 9 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| $151-$2,082 | 38 | 49 | 22 | 31 | 13 | 11 | 2 | 5 |
| $2,083-$2,820 | 6 | 14 | 7 | 3 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 1 |
| $2,821-$3,556 | 5 | 7 | 4 | 7 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 2 |
| $3,557-$4,292 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| $4,293-$5,030 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| $5,031-$5,694 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| $5,695-$6,344 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| $6,345-$7,064 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| $7,065 or more | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Table 5.1: Housing Size vs. Income (CalFresh Eligibility)
In the above graph, cells highlighted in green & bold indicate a person is potentially eligible for CalFresh based on their income and cells highlighted in red & italics indicate a person is not eligible. This information is pulled from the CalFresh requirements section A2 (see below for link).
The majority of people claim to purchase/prepare food (household size) for 2 people (92 people claimed this). This is followed by 88 people claiming to have a household size of 1 person, and 58 people claiming to have a household size of 4 people. The majority of people’s household income (despite household size) seems to be in the range $151-$2,082 (177 people). As the income bracket increases, the number of people within those bracket decreases drastically. Only 16 people claim to have a monthly income greater than $4,292.
CalFresh Eligible
This variable was created under the following criteria (n=310, 76% of 407 reporting).
Disclaimer: only county eligibility workers have the authority to determine official eligibility for CalFresh. These students are just most likely to be eligible based on the below listed criteria.
- The person is between the ages 18 to 49.
- The person is at least a part-time student (6 units per semester for
the three campuses in this survey).
- The person is either a U.S. citizen or lawful permanent
resident.
- Does not get more than half of their meals from meals plans (< 11
per week or none).
- Identifies as an EOP student.
- Falls under the household size/income from the Department of Social Services requirements.
Figure 5.2: Eligible for CalFresh
We can see that the majority of participants are most likely eligible for CalFresh (260 people), while 50 people are most likely to not be eligible for these benefits.
🏫 📊 Campus Breakdown
Click here for campus breakdown of CalFresh eligible students.
Figure 5.3: CalFresh Eligible by Campus
From the figure above, we can see that Chico has the most students who fall under the category of potentially being eligible for CalFresh. Both Fresno and Northridge have around one third less students who are potentially eligible for CalFresh, with nearly identical numbers.