The Evans Scholarship: A Full Ride for Caddies

The Chick Evans Scholarship is a full tuition and housing college scholarship awarded to caddies with strong grades and real financial need. It is administered by the Western Golf Association through its Evans Scholars Foundation, funded largely by golfers and member clubs, and it has been running since 1930.

The scale is not small. More than 12,000 caddies have graduated as Evans Scholars, and around 1,260 are enrolled today across roughly two dozen universities where the Foundation operates scholarship houses. Scholars live together in those houses, which is a big part of why the program reports a graduation rate in the mid-90s. If your family is already spending on junior golf and worrying about college costs, this is a door worth understanding before you write it off as a long shot.

The Foundation evaluates every applicant against four criteria. All four matter; a strong caddie record does not cover for weak grades, and good grades do not cover for a thin caddie record.

• A strong caddie record. You must have caddied regularly and successfully for at least two years, and you are expected to caddie at your sponsoring club during the year you apply.
• Excellent academics. Applicants are expected to finish their junior year of high school with above a B average in college-preparatory courses.
• Demonstrated financial need. You must clearly show a need for financial assistance, documented through the CSS Profile and FAFSA.
• Outstanding character. The Foundation looks for integrity and leadership, backed by recommendations and evaluations.

Verify the current wording and any test-score policy on wgaesf.org before you apply, since the Foundation updates its terms year to year.

The single most important thing to understand: the Evans Scholarship has almost nothing to do with how well you play golf. It rewards years of service in the caddie yard, academics, and need. A scratch player with no caddie record and full family resources does not qualify. A solid student who has looped two summers and needs the help does.

That makes it a completely different path from a golf scholarship, which a coach hands out based on your tournament scoring, and from the recruiting process covered in our free recruiting guide. A player can pursue both at once: caddie toward an Evans award while also chasing a spot on a college team. They run on separate tracks and separate applications.

You cannot apply for the Evans without a caddie record, and most families have no idea how to get one. The practical route is a local private or country club that runs a caddie program. Call the golf shop or caddie master, ask whether they take on junior caddies, and find out when their training runs. Many clubs start new caddies in spring and want you back the following seasons, which is exactly the multi-year record the scholarship looks for.

If no club near you runs a caddie program, the WGA Caddie Academy is a direct on-ramp. It is a live-in summer program for students who show character, academic success, and financial need but cannot caddie because of where they live. Participants live at residential sites, caddie six days a week at nearby clubs, and keep their earnings. Completing three summers makes a participant eligible to apply for the Evans Scholarship. Applications for the Academy open in the winter of a student’s freshman year; confirm the current dates and sites on the Caddie Academy’s site.

The two-year caddie requirement drives everything. To have that record in hand when you apply as a high school senior, you need to start caddying by your sophomore year at the latest, and earlier is better. A freshman who starts looping has room for a slow first season and still arrives at the application with three summers behind them.

Here is the shape of it:

Miss the two-year window and there is no shortcut, so the useful move for a golf family is to line up a caddie job early, the same way you would plan a junior golf budget.

The senior-year application is a package, not a form. You submit a completed CSS Profile and FAFSA for the financial-need review, a high school evaluation, a caddie evaluation from your club, letters of recommendation, your transcript, and test scores where they apply. Applications open Aug. 1 and must be complete by Oct. 15.

After the deadline, the Scholarship Committee reviews applications and interviews finalists in person before making its decisions. Selection rests with the Committee, and decisions are finalized by the spring. The interview is real, so the character and leadership piece is not a box to check; it is something the Committee asks you about directly.

The Foundation partners with a set of universities where it runs scholarship houses, and a Scholar attends one of those schools on full tuition and housing. The list of partner campuses changes over time, so check the current schools on wgaesf.org rather than assuming a specific university is on it. The award is renewable across your four years as long as you stay in good standing.

For a family staring down the numbers, this is among the most valuable aid packages in the game, and it goes to kids who would rarely land a playing scholarship. If college golf itself is the goal, weigh the real odds of playing college golf and treat the caddie path as a separate, parallel opportunity rather than a fallback.