National Adult Literacy Database

This handbook guides parents through the process of setting up a Registered Education Savings Plan (RESP) to help pay for their children’s postsecondary education.

An RESP is a type of savings account, registered with the Government of Canada, to which the government contributes a certain amount of money to help it grow faster. The amount contributed by the government is called the Canada Education Savings Grant (CESG) and is available to every child who is a Canadian resident.

The authors explain that in addition to the CESG, the government also has two grant programs aimed specifically at helping low-income families: the Canada Learning Bond (CLB) and the Additional Canadian Education Savings Grant (A-CESG).

They provide some examples to show how the grants would work for different families, calculating the amount a family could save in an RESP by the time a child is ready for college or university.