Leaders from Cal Poly and Cal Maritime Academy offer details on plan to combine operations
Senator Cabaldon and Senate colleagues Laird and Jones tour Vallejo campus and discuss how to boost enrollment at the West Coast’s only state Maritime Academy
Vallejo (March 20, 2025)—State Senator Christopher Cabaldon Thursday toured the California State University Maritime Academy (Cal Maritime) campus with legislative colleagues to learn about its preparations to integrate operations with Cal Poly San Luis Obispo.
Sen. Cabaldon is carrying legislation, SB 640, aimed at boosting enrollment at Cal Maritime and other CSUs that have struggled to attract applicants despite delivering strong employment and income outcomes. Cal Maritime is set to combine with Cal Poly in July – a move that will help it reduce administrative and other overhead costs.
Cal Maritime, located in Cabaldon’s 3rd Senate District, is the only state Maritime Academy on the West Coast. It prepares students for careers in the maritime industry, including those who go on to become Merchant Marine officers commanding commercial vessels worldwide.
“Cal Maritime is a jewel in District 3, with a strong track record of dramatically improving the earning potential of its graduates,” Sen. Cabaldon said. “This place changes lives, and we need to expose more young people to the possibilities it could open up for them.”
The combined institution will begin serving students in fall 2026. The 92-acre maritime campus in Vallejo will be known as “Cal Poly, Solano Campus” and will house the “Cal Poly Maritime Academy.”
Cal Poly President Jeff Armstrong and Cal Maritime Interim President Michael Dumont led the campus tour, which included stops in the ship deck simulator and on the Golden Bear, the training vessel that takes students on ocean voyages each year. Sen. Cabaldon, D-Yolo, was joined by Sens. John Laird, D-Santa Cruz and Minority Leader Brian Jones, R-San Diego.
The enrollment struggles of Cal Maritime and Sonoma State University, also in District 3, were part of his motivation for introducing SB 640, a bill that would automatically admit qualified graduating high school seniors to at least one California State University campus – no application required.
"Tens of thousands of California students are fully qualified to go to CSU, but don't jump the hurdles of the admissions process,” Cabaldon said. “At the same time, nearly half of CSU's campuses have substantial available enrollment capacity and need more students to sustain their high quality academic programs. High schools and community colleges already have all the transcript information they need in order to validate that a graduating student is CSU-admissible. SB 640 seals the cracks through which too many students fall and gets a coveted letter of admission to thousands of qualified students."
SB 640 builds on a successful direct admissions pilot by CSU in Riverside and is modeled on the nationally acclaimed West Sacramento College Promise Program started when Sen. Cabaldon was mayor, under which every senior in West Sacramento automatically receives an offer of admission to Sacramento City College.
In addition to the automatic CSU admission provisions, SB 640 also directs the community college system to create new transfer pathways to high-performing CSU programs like those offered at Cal Maritime.
Cal Maritime, opened in 1929, is one of just six state maritime academies nationwide and the only one on the West Coast. The State Maritime Academies train more than 70 percent of the Merchant Marine officers in the United States.
The scenic Vallejo campus offers one of the most sure-fire ways for California students from modest means to dramatically improve their earnings. In 2024, CNBC ranked it sixth among colleges nationwide whose graduates earned the highest salaries. According to its survey, Cal Maritime students earned a median salary of $82,600 after graduation and $156,200 mid-career.
Ninety-five percent of students enrolled in one of the school’s U.S. Coast Guard licensing programs – the vast majority of students -- are employed in their field within three months of graduation.
Students in the license-track degree programs earn both a U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) license and a bachelor's degree. Cal Maritime also offers degree programs in areas including Oceanography, Business Administration, and International Strategy and Security.
Despite the school’s impressive record of achievement for students, the number of students enrolled at Cal Maritime dropped from 1,107 in 2016-17 to about 800 today.
By joining with Cal Poly, Cal Maritime will get help with administrative and overhead costs, and a greater ability to reinvest in campus dormitories and other facilities, said Armstrong, the Cal Poly president. Being part of the well-known and respected Cal Poly brand will also help, he said.
Armstrong said Cal Poly plans to gradually double enrollment at Cal Maritime to about 1,500, in part by increasing capacity in non-licensure majors such as oceanography and business. Students from communities surrounding the Vallejo campus will continue to receive priority for admission, he said.
Cal Maritime is set to get a major upgrade, including a new pier and use of a new $350-million purpose-built ship funded and owned by the federal government. Golden State, under construction now in Philadelphia, will replace Golden Bear, which has been taking students on summer sea voyages for nearly three decades.
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Senator Christopher Cabaldon represents the 3rd Senate District which includes the cities of Oakley and Brentwood in Contra Costa County; American Canyon, Calistoga, Napa, Yountville, and St. Helena in Napa County; Benicia, Dixon, Fairfield, Rio Vista, Suisun City, Vacaville, and Vallejo, in Solano County; Cotati, Rohnert Park, and Sonoma in Sonoma County; Davis, West Sacramento, Winters, and Woodland in Yolo County; as well as Isleton in Sacramento County.