State Senator Christopher Cabaldon’s legislation to automatically admit every qualifying high school senior in California to the California State University cleared its final vote in the Legislature on Wednesday and now heads to the governor’s desk.
This comes three months after the bill — SB 640 — was passed unanimously in the state senate.
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If Governor Newsom signs the bill, students whose grades and coursework qualify them for CSU admission will receive a letter signed by the chancellor telling them they’ve been accepted at a list of campuses with enrollment capacity.
According to a news release, “Education research shows receiving such an acceptance letter can prompt a student to attend a four-year college when they otherwise would not – findings that are driving the adoption of direct admission – also known as automatic admission –around the country.”
“We should make it as seamless for our students to go from 12th grade to the next stage of their education as was for them to go sixth grade to seventh grade,” Senator Cabaldon said in the same news release. “Direct admission removes the applications hurdle that stops some students from going to college, and relieves the fear that they won’t get in anywhere.”
In June, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker of Illinois signed legislation to offer direct admission at nine of the state’s 11 public, four-year university campuses. An analysis of Idaho’s direct admissions program concluded that it has boosted total undergraduate enrollments by 4-8 percent and in-state enrollments by 8-15 percent.
In California, SB 640 builds on West Sacramento’s acclaimed Home Run program, started when Cabaldon was mayor, which automatically admits all high school seniors, tuition-free, to Sacramento City College.
The legislation also extends statewide a CSU pilot program that this year sent all qualified high school seniors in Riverside County an offer of admission to 10 campuses, most of which are under-enrolled. Of the 17,000 students who received offers of admission for the fall 2025 semester, 13,200 completed the required paperwork – an increase of 3,000 over the previous year.
Cabaldon not only seeks to provide more opportunity for Californians, but also to reverse enrollment declines that have affected many campuses. Two of the campuses that have seen the greatest drops in attendance are in Cabaldon’s District 3: the CSU Maritime Academy in Vallejo – which recently combined operations with Cal Poly San Luis Obispo — and Sonoma State, which announced drastic cuts for the coming year before being granted an allocation of $45 million in this year’s state budget. However, Cal Maritime officials reported an 8 percent increase in enrollment for the fall semester.
SB 640 is co-authored by Senate Education Committee Chair Sasha Renée Pérez, and the entire Sonoma County legislative delegation, including Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire, Assembly Majority Leader Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, Assemblymember Damon Connolly and Assemblymember Chris Rogers. Additional co-authors include Senator Aisha Wahab and Assembly members Pilar Schiavo, Liz Ortega, and Catherine Stefani.