In the spring of 2024, Andrew Rodriguez was a talented teen golfer hoping he had caught a break. A high school sophomore in Whittier, Calif., Rodriguez had honed a reliable swing with a local instructor and begun to excel on various Southern California junior tours. But to achieve his ultimate goal of playing Division I college golf, he now needed to grab the attention of college coaches, and the best way to do that was to perform on a bigger stage.
To his credit, Rodriguez had earned just that chance, getting into the field for the Mack Champ Invitational, a junior event held in April at The Woodlands outside Houston and organized by PGA Tour pro Cameron Champ in honor of his grandfather. It was farther away from home than Rodriguez and his father Marco usually traveled for a tournament and would cost more to compete in. However, a few months earlier Rodriguez been among an initial group of junior golfers to receive a grant from the U.S. National Development Program. The money could be spent for travel, so father and son made their way to the Lone Star State.
Rodriguez’s bet on himself paid off. He played well, finishing T-5 in the 78-player field, which earned him an exemption into an AJGA invitational event a few months later in North Carolina. There, he finished in T-33 after shooting a closing 69 at Sedgefield Country Club, the same course used to host the PGA Tour’s Wyndham Championship. That got him another exemption into an AJGA event, but arguably more important, it got him the interest from college coaches in attendance. That summer, when coaches could formally reach out to Rodriguez, he got calls from more than a dozen programs. By the time his college search had come to an end, he had verbally committed to Long Beach State.
“It feels like a dream come true,” Andrew says looking back at the dominos that fell for him. “And without the help of the grant my dream wouldn't have been possible. I mean getting that exposure from the college coaches down at those big tournaments, that had a major impact in my college recruitment. So them helping me playing those big tournaments was a huge help.”
It's a story that brings a smile to the face of Heather Daly-Donofrio, managing director, player relations and development, for the U.S. National Development Program. When the USGA launched the USNDP in 2023, much was made of how it would establish a national junior team and an elite amateur program. No less consequential was the simultaneous creation of a grant program that reached a broader swath of junior golfers to help with golf’s cost barriers.
More From Golf Digest
In the grant program’s first year in 2024, 72 golfers ages 13 to 18 received more than $650,000 to cover incurred golf and athlete development-related expenses, including practice and green fees, travel and tournament fees, coaching and equipment costs. In 2025, the USGA allocated $795,000 to 100 families representing 31 states.
Grants are awarded in increments of $2,500 with many recipients receiving the maximum allotment of $10,000 (in 2026, that is jumping to $15,000). When applying, boys and girls submit swing videos as well as tournament results. Letters of recommendations are required, as well as demonstration of some financial need. (Applications for 2026 are open through Oct. 31, 2025; click here for more information.)
Ultimately, the team picking grant recipients took a holistic approach to the process. “Our goal,” Daly-Donofrio says, “is to find athletes who are not necessarily populating the rankings or on scoreboards that come across our desk every day, but finding those athletes who really have the potential to progress through the pathway, who may not have had the opportunity or the resources.”
Others echo Rodriguez in relaying the domino effect created when using the grant dollars. Mara King of Lake Mary, Fla., a grant recipient in 2024 and 2025, says she got the chance to go to more high-profile junior tournaments thanks to her funding. That exposure allowed her to talk to the coaching staff at Penn State, where King has begun playing this fall.
“It really, really ramped up my schedule,” King says. “Before the grant, I only played local tournaments. My family didn't really know the importance of traveling and playing in the tournaments at the best fields.”
Mara King used her grant money to play in more high profile events. She says that helped her land a spot on the Penn State women's golf team. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. National Development Program)
Having money to help with travel expenses is a big deal, but the grants also can be applied to other golf-related needs. Rodriguez used some of his funds to start working with a fitness coach. It was “a game changer,” according to Marco, because it allowed his son to find somebody who could incorporate “golf-specific” fitness tailored to Andrew’s skill set. In turn, he has seen his body filled out and he increased his distance. Andrew also thinks being more fit is preventing injury.
Grant-program recipients don’t just receive stipends. They also gain access to additional USNDP resources and athletic support services. Over the course of the year, recipients can participate in virtual seminars about numerous topics, from college recruiting to fitness and nutrition and more. One-on-one consultations with USNDP coaches are also available.
After one seminar that focused on how to use statistics to help with course management and indentify areas for game improvement, Rodriguez says he started tracking more stats and journaling. His game continued to develop this past summer, when he won his first AJGA event, got to compete in the Junior Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass and rose to 54th in the Polo AJGA Junior rankings.
“When we developed the grant program, we didn't want it to be just about the dollars,” Daly-Donofrio says. “We wanted it also to be about building relationships with the athletes and their families and ensuring they had other tools that could help drive development. We were intentional about engagement with the families by our national coaches.”
USNDP leadership also monitors the progress of the grant recipients. After Eva Becerril of Cincinnati, Ohio, won her state high school championship last fall, she got messages from Daly-Donofrio and Dr. Beth Brown, a senior athlete development specialist.
“These little things go a long way because, you know, the process of the journey is tough, it's a lot of work,” said Joe Becerril, Eva’s father.
King got a kick out of a swag package the USNDP sent last winter around the holidays that included a polo shirt and quarter-zip pull over.
Daly-Donofrio is hopeful that some grant recipients can develop their games enough to potentially graduate up to the national junior team or join state teams that the USNDP has been building in 2025.
“I do think over time our grant program has the potential to impact many more lives of junior golfers than any other part of our program,” Daly-Donofrio says. “Where we have athletes who are getting college scholarships who never thought they would even get a look from a college coach and really preparing them for the next level. I believe that we are and will continue to change lives through the grant program.”
Indeed, while developing their games is at the heart of the grant program, developing them as individuals is critical, too. Eva Becerril says being connected to the grant program the last two years has opened up doors to opportunities she hadn’t thought possible.
“It's nice playing with girls from all over the world,” says Eva, who is headed to Boise State next fall. “Just talking to them about different experiences they've had versus experiences I've had in life … there’s people I've met in the summer that I'm still friends with who live in New Mexico and California and places like that that I still talk to today.”
Andrew Rodriguez agrees. “What I’ve learned from golf, making all the new relationships, learning a bunch of life lessons, those I’ll have for the rest of my life.”