Welcome to the Matched Education Savings Account College Initiative, or MESA. MESA supports Oregonians with limited financial resources in achieving post-secondary education by leveraging their savings and incentivizing positive financial behaviors. MESA is a matched savings account (also known as an individual development account, or IDA) for Oregon's current and future students to pursue post-secondary education.
Education is an Asset
Education is a key economic asset that belongs to an individual for a lifetime. It is also one of the strongest rungs on the ladder to self-sufficiency and greatest measures of human capital.
"Education, then, beyond all other devices of human origin, is the great equalizer of the conditions of man,- the balance-wheel of the social machinery." - Horace Mann
Part of a nationwide asset-building strategy, MESA is based on the premise that individuals gain economic self-sufficiency through savings and investment, coupled with the development of human capital. The strategy sees that the accumulation of assets as the key to the improvement of the economic condition of low-income households. MESA strengthens families by providing them with the financial skills and tools to build wealth through habitual savings and financial education.