of US National Development Programnow in its third year, it was founded with a lofty mission: to foster the next generation of American golf talent by providing a path to success.
While the start of The youth national team and Junior State Team programs have earned most of the program’s headlines, a relatively unheralded element of the USNDP is its grants, which are distributed in the form of annual reimbursement-based funding to families of competitive young players who have the potential to advance through the USNDP development pathway and demonstrate financial need.
In 2025, the second year of the grant program, 109 athletes — 52 girls and 57 boys from 32 different states (52 percent of whom are athletes of color) — and their families received an annual USNDP grant totaling more than $865,000 provided by the USGA and made possible thanks to donors and partners like Ally. Three grantees are players on the US junior national team.
How does a player get a grant? The program begins with a preliminary application, which determines the family’s basic income level. If eligibility for need-based support is established, the player can move on to a more comprehensive application, which includes a performance component (current handicap requirements are set at 2.4 or better for boys and 5.4 or better for girls) as well as a letter of intent on how the player or family plans to use the funds.
four USGA staff are tasked with evaluating applications, and annual funding decisions are made by a larger group at a roundtable session at the end of each year.
“We know that not all of our players will go pro, and we’re OK with that,” said Heather Daly-Donofrio, the US National Development Program’s managing director of player relations and development. “We want to help these athletes achieve their goals in the game wherever those goals take them, especially with our grantees. A lot of them, when they started with our program, never thought they’d be playing at a D1 college, and they’re getting offers at D1 colleges now. So that’s really encouraging for us as well, just to get these players from a good high school level to being able to be able to be at a high school. medium.”
THE MODERN ELITE JUNIOR golf requires extensive travel. For many players, getting on a college coach’s radar means entering tournaments across the country. The financial burden can be heavy on families, which is why the USGA also partners with the AJGA to help grant recipients access AJGA tournament courses close to home. Grants can also be used for different categories of game development, such as coaching, access to practice facilities or even visits to a sports psychologist.
But using the money for travel expenses and tournament entries is a popular choice. In addition to the grant, recipients are also welcomed into the USNDP ecosphere, where they have access to athlete development webinars on topics such as nutrition, values and target selection on the greens. Seventeen such sessions were available to players in 2025, led by USNDP’s staff of expert coaches and consultants.
“The kids that are really gravitating toward those additional resources are a lot of the kids that we’re really seeing improving,” Daly-Donofrio said.
How important is the grant program to these players? Two recipients make worthy case studies. For Ventura, Calif., resident Austin Dennis, the availability of grant funding has been a game changer—literally.
“USNDP helped transform my game,” he said. “The resume that I have this year is completely different than last year. I think I probably had five red numbers all of last year and I had about five red numbers in the last month.
“The financial side of it has helped. Especially helping me get into the AJGA, because those are the main events, so I’ve been able to compete a lot better.”
Austin recently tied for second place at the AJGA Senior Showcase and on the year, posted five wins, 10 top-5 finishes, 13 top-10s and moved up 54 spots in his class standings. In addition to playing in 21 events, Austin has been heavily involved in USNDP Grant Program webinars and diligently tracked statistics using the program’s free data app, Accel Golf.
When Austin was accepted as a grantee, it not only enabled him to purchase new equipment, but also gave him the exposure he wanted on the tour.
“(Grant) just opened the door to basically everything that we wanted to provide for him, but we couldn’t,” said Austin’s mother, Summer. “We just couldn’t figure out how to get his ranking and everything in the hands of his peers in his class because we couldn’t afford to do those tournaments. This year was a game changer.”
Stepping up in the strength of the tournament field was also a confidence boost for Austin.
“I always tell myself this quote: ‘I apply pressure, I don’t let pressure get to me,'” he said. “(Grant) leveled the playing field. The only reason these kids, to me, felt like they had an advantage was just because of the resources they had. They could go to their trainer once a week. They could go to the nicest facilities and practices, and I’m here, not saying it’s bad or anything, but like, I’m on a public course that I have to figure out when I can play and play publicly that much (‘).
“I only get to see my coach once a month. So being able to get this money, I was like, boy, I have the resources now that some of these kids have. Just give me some time. I’m going to get to y’all.”
While Austin has yet to land on a college golf home for next fall, he is currently weighing his options after receiving offers and interest from a number of schools.
“For whichever program Austin ends up playing, they’re going to be lucky,” Daly-Donofrio said. “He’s going to be a great teammate. He’s a hard worker. He’s one of our most engaged athletes from the point of view of going into stats and working with our coaches based on his stats, participating in webinars and you can see it in his record. He’s been playing great golf the last few months because he’s working hard, he’s committed to the program and he wants to show, show better. He’s going to find a great home.”
Austin is nothing if not confident about his future prospects.
“I’ll be on the Tour one day,” he said. “It’s a matter of when.”
OHIO-based MADOW TIAN has a similar story. Meadow, who is committed to play golf at the University of Illinois next fall, is a member of the Ohio State Junior Team and used her grant primarily to travel to tournaments in the Southeast.
This year, Meadow has recorded four wins, including two AJGA wins, in 12 total events (7 AJGA, 5 others) and has a 73.06 scoring average.
“Being able to go outside of Ohio and just like the surrounding regions, being able to travel, maybe the West Coast or the East Coast, especially the South, has been really appealing,” she said. “Being able to train on grass is amazing in the winter. Last year was my first year being able to travel down (south) for tournaments, and being able to compete during December, January, February, those types of months, it’s just nice to not have a super long stretch of not being able to compete and not practice on grass.”
Playing tournaments outside of her local area had a big impact on her recruitment, Meadow said.
“It opened a lot of doors for me, being able to go up and meet some coaches, play in front of them and just introduce myself and eventually reach out and bond,” she said.
The goal of the USNDP grant program is to triple in growth over the next several years. And while professional golf and major championships are obvious aspirations, Daly-Donofrio says the program is ultimately about much more than chasing tour titles.
“When we get an email from one of our grantees that says, ‘I just signed with X college,’ we literally do a dance in the office because we’re so excited for them,” she said. “And who knows where that will lead. It might lead to professional golf, it might not, but we hope that the kids have a lifelong love of the game, that they can give back to the program at some point, that they can work on the game, work on the sport, learn golf. Truly, cultivating that love of the game for a lifetime.
“Our work is not done when we refund those funds. Our work is not done until we help get these kids where they want to go.”
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