Academic closures, mergers, and cuts: heading into fall 2025

Greetings from the onrushing fall semester.  Well, for some of us the term has already begun. I’ve taught two of my three classes and the third is coming up fast.

Today I’ll share an update on one particular and grim dimension of higher education developments.  As a futurist, I prefer to ground my extrapolations deeply in the present, so I spend a lot of time scanning the horizon for documentable seeds of potential futures. For American colleges and universities that includes, sadly, and among other things, more stories of campus closures, cuts, and mergers. In this post you’ll see a list of these, with links to supporting news stories and official documents.  Alas, this has become a tradition here.

(From 2024: March 1, March 20, March 28, April, May, June, July, September, November. From 2025: February, June, July. So far.)

Most of this post is about cuts.  There’s only one closure to report and no mergers.  The cuts, program closures, department shut downs, buyouts, etc. happened across the country and in a variety of institutions.  I’ll also touch on a few developments in other countries, notably the massive cuts in Canada.  I’ve added a few keywords describing each institution, along with a link to their Wikipedia article.

1. Closing colleges and universities

The King’s College (Christian, New York City) announced it would close, after years of struggle with accreditation, COVID-19, and finances.

we must announce that The King’s College will remain closed permanently and that we will begin to dissolve it under the guidance of the relevant state authorities.

Outside the United States, Spurgeon’s College (Baptist, London; founded 1856) announced it would close due to “significant financial challenges for several years, driven by declining student numbers and an increasingly complex and difficult financial landscape.”

2 Campuses cutting programs and jobs

Clark University (private research university; Massachusetts),”plans to cut more than a quarter of its faculty in the coming years,” according to local media.  The reason is dropping enrollment, both domestic and international.  For the latter, Clark is especially exposed: “[m]ore than a third of Clark’s undergrads and two-thirds of its graduate students come from abroad.”  On the chopping block are instructors who teach in what Clark President David Fithian described as “our lowest enrollment programs.”

(This is an example of what I’ve referred to as a queen sacrifice, assuming some or all of those cut faculty are tenure-track.)

The university will also redirect funds in order to “focus on fields like climate and environment, media and computing, and health and human behavior — areas Clark leaders say are more relevant to today’s world and job market.”  So they will presumably hire new faculty and redefine jobs of some current ones, while cutting others.

Notre Dame de Namur University (Catholic, California) will sell its physical campus and transition to a largely online teaching operation, after years of financial crises.  (I wrote about their financial problems back in 2020.). They tried selling to Stanford University, but Stanford backed out after four years of negotiations.

Middlebury College (private liberal arts; Vermont) announced it would shut down its Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey, California (MIIS) in two years.  President Ian B. Baucom described this as a financial decision, with MIIS losing enrollment and running a deficit.  According to Wikipedia, MIIS currently employs 70 full time staff plus 70 adjuncts.

Northwestern University (private; research; Illinois) will cut more than 400 staff positions, of which roughly half are already unfilled. It represents a 5% cut to total campus personnel expenses. The given cause: the Trump administration’s cuts and investigations.

Stanford University (private, research; California) laid off 363 staff in the wake of federal cuts and pressure. There aren’t many detailed about which positions and people have been axed yet, but that linked article mentions at least one librarian. Stanford is facing a $140 million budget cut.

Temple University (public research; Pennsylvania) is ending 190 positions, including laying off 50 people.  The reason is a $60 million budget deficit.

The University of Southern California (private, research) laid off 89 people from its Keck Medicine and the Keck School of Medicine.  The Morning Trojan counts 342 job cuts “since July.” USC’s interim president Beong-Soo Kim warned of cuts several weeks ago: “To deal decisively with our financial challenges, we need to transform our operating model, and that will require layoffs.”  Kim cited a persistent structural deficit as well as the Trump administration.

The University of Florida (public research) ended 75 positions, terminating an unspecified number of people.  The rationale: “University officials say the cuts are part of a 5 percent reduction in administrative expenses announced by the UF Board of Trustees.”

UF also shut down its sustainability office, firing three people.  Officials told local media the reasons were that budget reduction, especially “an effort to ‘identify new efficiencies.’”  I think it’s clear that there was also politics here, ending a climate change program in a state governed by a reactionary governor and under an anti-climate Trump administration.  Another local site cited an official statement which offered this defense: “UF has made great strides in adopting efficiency principles, environmental stewardship and economic viability through the Office of Sustainability, and those principles are now embedded into UF’s business practices.”

The University of New Hampshire (public, research) terminated 23 people and ended 13 unfilled positions. This follows a similar cut earlier this year, when “Thirty-five additional UNH employees were laid off in May as part of a $12.5 million reduction.”  One reason for this is New Hampshire’s state budget, which just cut public university funding by 18%.

Michigan State University (public research) announced it would lay off staff including the director of and some workers in its mental health services. The reason is ongoing financial problems.  The Detroit News added these details: “the 2025 budget shows the university spent nearly $4.5 million on mental health and trauma services counseling and psychiatric services. Most of the costs were to pay employee salaries, wages and benefits.”

Kalamazoo College (private liberal arts; Michigan) laid off eleven staff members and modified the jobs of four others, citing financial pressures including inflation.

Whitman College (private, liberal arts; Washington state) laid off 10 as yet unidentified people. In addition, Whitman is

leaving some vacant positions unfilled; and only giving 1% raises to most staffers earning more than $70,000 a year, instead of the 2% raises that had been scheduled. The salaries of cabinet members and the president were also reduced by 2% and 10%, respectively.

The reason: a $3 million budget shortfall.

Bennington College (private liberal arts; Vermont) announced on Facebook that it would lay off fifteen staff.

Why these cuts? Bennington’s president Laura Walker told VTDigger that “[l]ike many peer institutions across the country, we are confronting an uncertain economy and a challenging overall environment for higher education.”

In Canada, Ontario’s public universities have laid off 10,000 faculty and staff as that nation’s cuts to international enrollment take hold, according to one count.

3 Budget crises, programs cut, not laying off people yet

In this section I list program cuts, departmental closures, and other events which don’t immediately involve personnel being laid off, but which could plausibly do so in the near term future.

The president of Southern Oregon University (public) announced a series of program cuts which might entail staffing reductions.

The new plan calls for the elimination of 15 of the school’s 38 academic majors, including chemistry, economics, international studies and Spanish. Dozens of jobs may be cut, including 29 faculty positions, as the university looks to become a $60 million-a-year operation, a decrease of 15 percent.

The reason is an enrollment drop, which means – officially – the institution is overbuilt: “By their calculations, the school has enough employees to support 7,500 students — about 4,000 more than it is actually enrolling.”  SOU has been struggling for several years: “The university, in Ashland, Ore., eliminated 82 jobs just two years ago, but school officials think their work force is still far too large.”

The University of Chicago (private, research; Illinois) responded to Trump cuts by pausing or reducing PhD program admissions.  In the first move Chicago focused on languages and humanities:

The departments that won’t be accepting Ph.D. students now include art history, cinema and media studies, classics, comparative literature, East Asian languages and civilizations, English language and literature, Germanic studies, linguistics, Middle Eastern studies, Romance languages and literatures, Slavic languages and literatures, and South Asian languages and civilizations, plus the music department’s ethnomusicology and history and theory of music programs.

Next, not just the humanities:

The Social Sciences Division has also announced it will not admit Ph.D. students into four programs in 2026-27: anthropology, political economy, social thought, and conceptual and historical studies of science. The UChicago Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy and Practice had earlier announced it was pausing Ph.D. admissions and the Harris School of Public Policy said it was pausing admissions for the Harris Ph.D. (in public policy studies), the political economy Ph.D. and the master of arts in public policy with certificate in research methods.

It’s possible that, beyond the Trump crisis, the university held and lost money in crypto currency speculation.

Princeton University (private, research; New Jersey) ended its Wintersession mini-term as the campus “continues to reduce costs amid budget uncertainty.”  The announcement also includes quite a phrase: “This change and other cost-reduction efforts reflect financial challenges spurred by the federal government’s reassessment of its relationship with American higher education.” (italics added)

The University of Connecticut (public, research university) shut down seven academic programs, “four graduate certificate programs and three degree programs in mathematics and medieval studies.”  Additionally, “70 programs across multiple colleges will be monitored annually, with plans to improve enrollment and completion rates.”

The governing board of the University of Utah (public research) shut down a number of academic programs (official list here) for underenrollment.   They include, according to an official statement, “just under 30 master’s degree programs, 15 doctoral degrees, another 30 undergraduate and certificate programs, as well as 9 minors.”  The same document offers this context: “The university offers more than 100 undergraduate degrees and 200 graduate degrees across all colleges and departments.”

Milligan University (private, Tennessee) cut six programs: undergraduate degrees in computer science, cybersecurity, film, information systems, and journalism, plus a Master of Arts in Coaching and Sports Management.  According to that linked report, MU president Stephen Waers “said the college market is changing and there have been challenges in enrollment, which led to the decision to cut the programs.”

Cornell University (private, research; New York) posted a grim view of its finances. The joint statement by the campus’ president, provost, provost for medical affairs, and chief financial officer describes economic and political threats familiar to my readers, then added this warning of cuts to come:

Reducing costs will mean reconsidering how we handle all of our processes, from procurement to technology, and rethinking, in fundamental ways, how we allocate our resources. It will also, inevitably, mean reducing our workforce.

The University of Nebraska system will offer buyouts to one part of its professoriate: “tenured faculty age 62 or older with at least 10 years of service.”  The reason involves the flagship, at least: “The University of Nebraska-Lincoln is scrambling to cut $27.5 million from its budget by the end of the year.”

599 people took an early retirement offer from Duke University (private, research, North Carolina).  Even with those actions, “Duke officials said they also plan to start involuntary layoffs in August.”

The University of Wisconsin-Madison (public, research) closed two campus libraries, the Astronomy, Mathematics and Physics Library and the Social Work Library. The university did not announced any layoffs resulting.

Our Lady of the Lake University (Catholic; Texas) made program cuts earlier this year, but seems to have failed to teach out impacted students this fall term.  Here’s Texas Public Radio’s compiled list of said programs:

Reflections

As I’ve said before, it’s important to recognize that each college or university has its own circumstances and story. You can see that in these summaries with different campuses experiencing different challenges and exhibiting their own responses. Yet at the same time we can trace trends moving through the entire post-secondary sector.

Enrollment pressures continue to impact at least come campuses.  We can see that driving financial problems, especially for the supermajority of institutions which strongly rely on student tuition and fees for revenue.  Further, administrations are clearly using enrollment numbers when determining program cuts.

It’s clear that a major force driving these cuts, closures, etc. is the Trump administration’s campaign against higher education.  You’ll note the high number of high profile, very wealthy institutions on this list which are now bleeding out.  This shows no sign of slowing down. (Here’s where I now share my reports on what Trump is doing to academia.)

I’m seeing fewer mergers than I anticipated this year. Is it possible that finding a merger partner is just so difficult now that closure becomes more likely?  Or do institutions prefer to cut and shut down programs and staff before reaching out?

Notre Dame de Namur University offers one path for declining institutions, to give up on in-person instruction and bet all on online.

I was surprised but impressed to see Clark University decide to expand its climate change offerings, as it deeply cuts other programs.  The former shows some foresight.  It’s also a rare attitude, sadly.

I remain astonished by the sheer damage Canadian higher education is taking.  Americans might learn from that nation as we start to see international student numbers drop.

Note that this is pre-fall semester developments.  Worse may come over the next few months. We can expect some significant enrollment declines, notably from international students. Sustained pressure against diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs will likely depress underrepresented minority attendance. Further Trump actions against research universities may result in more financial hits.  Cuts to the Department of Education may lead to problems in institutional operations, including processing financial aid.  At the same time Republican-led state governments have been taking other steps against higher education, like Ohio’s SB1, which passed this year.

Next-to-last note: today we’ve focused on statistics, bureaucracy, formal communications, and finances, but these are also all stories about real human beings.  By my very rough count the layoffs summarized here impact more than 1200 people. The lives of students, faculty, staff and those in surrounding communities are all impacted by all of these events.  Don’t lose sight of that fact or of these people.

Finally, I’d like to invite anyone with information on a college or university’s plans to close, merge, or cut to share them with me, either as comments on this post, as notes on social media, or by contacting me privately here.  I write these posts based largely on public, open intelligence (news reports, investigations, roundups) but also through tips, since higher education sometimes has issues with transparency.  We need better information on these events.

(thanks to Inside Higher Ed for tracking these stories (for example); ditto Higher Ed Dive (for example); also Robin DeRosa, Karl Hakkarainen, Steven Kaye, Peter Naegele,  Christopher Rice, Peter Shea, Ed Webb)