Campus cuts, closures, mergers, and layoffs for spring 2026

Greetings from late spring in the Washington, DC area.  It’s a lovely time here as temperatures rise high enough to be pleasant, and every plant is growing or blossoming. 

I’ve been working on this post for months, as winter gave way to spring.  I was actually tempted to use the “April is the cruelest month” line as an introduction, but things just kept building up and pushing the post into May.  Heck, this one’s already too long.

Yes, today’s post is one of my semi-regular surveys of cuts to higher ed. I’ve been scanning for institutional closures, mergers, and staff/program cutbacks for several years. My goal is to collect evidence of such reductions, assembling them in one spot for public access and use.

(Previous posts –

from 2026: February

from 2025: February, June, July, August, October

from 2024: March 1, March 20, March 28, April, May, June, July, September, November. )

My focus in these posts is American higher education, mostly due to reasons of time as well as the distinct features of this nation’s academy. Today I’m adding more examples from Canada, as that nation deals with fallout from deciding to cut international student enrollment, fallout which canny Americans might pay heed to.

I’ve divided what follows into the usual five parts: institutional closures, mergers, cuts, and potential cuts to come, with some reflections at the end.

1 Closures

In early April a report held that Anna Maria College (private, Catholic; Massachusetts) might be out of funds. One week later the college’s Twitter/X account announced it would shut down by semester’s end.

The reason was chronic financial problems.

Also in Massachusetts, Hampshire College (private liberal arts) announced it would close, citing dwindling enrollment and resulting financial problems.  This semester it enrolled “about 625 students, [Hampshire’s president, Jennifer] Chrisler said, about half the school’s enrollment in the early 2000s.” In March, a regional accreditor warned Hampshire it could be placed on probation:

The administration is now rapidly seeking to sell its property to pay off more then $24 million in debt.

(This one hits me personally.  I have several friends from graduated from Hampshire. I once gave their library a small grant. I have been in touch with faculty there for years.  I’m very sad and worried about these people.)

Turning to the midwest, Lourdes University (Franciscan, Ohio) will close this month, according to its trustees: “Lourdes has faced significant and ongoing challenges related to declining enrollment, rising operational costs, and a funding model that is no longer sustainable… Continuing operations beyond this academic year is financially unsustainable.”

from the Lourdes University homepage

Also in the midwest, the Lake Forest Graduate School of Management (for-profit) will shut down this summer, citing declining enrollment.  Excelsior University will help teach out students. They announced they would offer a leadership program, although it won’t count for credit, and I’m not sure how that will work.

In Canada, Manitoba Institute of Trades and Technology will close.  Its official announcement cited massive national cuts to international student enrollment as the main driver, with foreign student numbers plunging by more than 50%.  According to Renée Cable, the provincial minster for Advanced Education and Training Minister, “[f]or this institution, their revenue has dropped more than half in the previous year and then this year again.”  Red River College Polytechnic will take over all MITT college classes.

Back to the United States: I’ll add one echo of a 2024 closure.  Albany County put up the College of Saint Rose’s library for auction.

2 Mergers

Curry College (private; Massachusetts) will acquire the medical programs of Labouré College of Healthcare (also private; Massachusetts). Labouré suffered from declining enrollment and financial issues.

In Canada, St. Lawrence College (applied arts; Ontario) and Fleming College (ditto) will merge.  The avowed goal is to create a richer experience for students.  Implicit is budget savings.  The linked article reports faculty and staff surprised by the announcement.  Analyst Alex Usher is skeptical of the announcement, pointing to its lack of specifics and the apparent financial imbalance between the two campuses.

Following up on one merger: as Kean University (public, New Jersey) starts absorbing New Jersey City University (public), NJCU seems to be terminating a lot of people. A local account cites “a source familiar with the layoffs,” who estimates 151 layoffs: “33 faculty members, including 24 tenured and nine non-tenured professors, received pink slips. The list of axed employees also includes two librarians, six non-tenure-track teachers and 110 professional staff members.”   More details are consistent with the economic model of asymmetrical mergers:

In some cases, entire staff offices are being wiped out, such as registration, transfers, admissions and academic advisors,” the source said. Those functions will likely be performed by Kean employees after the merger is complete.

(I wrote about NJCU decline into acquisition last year.)

3 Campuses cutting programs and jobs

Let’s shift from closing and merging campuses to cuts within them.

Santa Monica College (public community college, California) laid off 60 staff while letting 10 vacant positions remain unfilled.  Additionally, “the board [also] adopted amendments that open up all classified management and academic administrator positions — which number 49 and 46, respectively, according to a spokesperson — for potential elimination.”  The reasons?  A structural deficit, exacerbated by declining enrollment.

The University of New Haven (private, Connecticut) told some number of non-tenured faculty that the institution wouldn’t renew their contracts for fall semester.  The reason is a massive enrollment crash, driven by one major cause: “the change in international student enrollment means the university has gone from a student body of over 9,000 students to now slightly above 6,000 students over the past two years.”  As a result,

Jens Frederiksen, president of the University of New Haven, has said the change means that, despite actions to realign operational expenses, the university “must adjust to the new reality” and a “16-17% reduction in overall revenue.” Frederiksen said that in a memo to students and staff that was obtained by the Courant. The exact amount of revenue loss has not been named.

Rutgers University (public land-grant research; New Jersey) cut nearly 40 adjunct faculty who teach around 100 classes between them.  The adjunct union said there was no good reason to do so.

The College of Wooster (private liberal arts; Ohio) reorganized its administrative operations, cutting 22 staff  members and closing at least a dozen unfilled positions.  The reasons given are enrollment declines and a persistent deficit.   The college’s student newspaper interviewed the president, who said, among other things, that the administration was “trying to ramp down our staffing structure and our staffing expenses in line with our revenue and student body size.”   More on enrollment from president McCall:

So then you look at the picture and you say, ‘okay, we used to have 2,200 students, right?’ We started this year — there are always fewer students in the spring than in the fall, but we started the fall with 1,700 students. And we’re at, for the spring, you know, under 1,500. That’s 700 fewer students, that’s a third less, practically, than five years ago. So it also, intuitively or logically would make sense, that you should need fewer people if you’re serving fewer students, right?

Columbia College Chicago (private, art) laid off three senior administrators as that campus struggles with financial problems.

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (public, research) proposed a new budget with fewer cuts than anticipated, after already reducing staff over the past few months.  In January more cuts were in the air.  The reasons: unreliable federal and state funding.

In Canada, George Brown Polytechnic (applied arts, Ontario) made cuts in March then more in April. 133 workers lost their jobs, as far as I can make out, due to drops in international student enrollment. “[Y]ear-over-year full-time enrolment fall 29 per cent to 15,889,”

In December Mohawk College* (applied arts, Ontario) cut 65 jobs, including 20% of administrative staff and shutting down several programs.  In March it terminated 62 more workers, while ending open searches for 10 more positions. Voluntary separations have also occurred.  The reason was, as with George Brown, a serious international enrollment decline and financial crunch.

Brock University (public, research; Ontario) laid off roughly 45 staff.  According to a communications officer, “[t]he goal is to create clearer roles, improve workload balance and streamline the support provided within Faculties.”

Fanshawe College of Applied Arts and Technology (public, Ontario) suspended a series of programs:

• Advanced ergonomics
• Dental assisting
• Game development – advanced programming
• Manufacturing engineering technician (co-op)
• Photography advanced
• Software and information systems testing (co-op)
• Technical systems analysis (co-op)
• User experience design
• Visual effects and editing for contemporary media

Declining international enrollment is apparently the main reason for this action.

4 Impending or likely cuts

There were also news accounts which described what I view as potential cuts to come.

Pennsylvania State University (public, land-grant research) proposed ending 49 undergrad programs, due to low enrollment.  There is no word yet on potential labor implications.

Portland State University (public, research; Oregon) is considering cutting back or ending a series of departments due to a structural deficit.  Units on the block include Conflict Resolution department, the Portland Center (“a small study abroad department for students from Japan”), and University Studies.

Saint Augustine’s University (private, historically black, Christian; North Carolina) filed for bankruptcy after years of financial problems, dwindling enrollment, and losing accreditation.  The university described this as a move towards greater sustainability – “a deliberate and strategic step to advance the University’s long-term sustainability while addressing current financial realities” – but will not contest losing accreditation in the short term, and seems to be transitioning to a different type of academic institution:

SAU will instead focus on supporting students through teach-out agreements, developing non-degree certificates and apprenticeship programs, and building a pathway toward reaccreditation.

Leaders of the University of Providence (Catholic, Montana), after declaring financial exigency in December,  “expect to make recommendations for programs to close or pause” shortly.

Lane Community College (public; Oregon) is considering shutting two academic programs and terminating 20 jobs as it faces a substantial financial deficit.

Appalachian School of Law (private, Virginia) is seeking financial support from its county government, after a decade of low enrollments and running deficits.

Harrisburg University of Science and Technology (private, Pennsylvania) missed a $1 million debt payment on a building it constructed, but which remains two-thirds untenanted.  According to Wikipedia,

In 2023, the university downsized employees due to a budget shortfall. In May 2024, the university missed a bond payment, signifying a cash flow crunch. A second round of layoffs took place in June 2024. In July 2024, the university closed its locations in Dubai and Panama.

However, Pennlive notes that after those cuts, HU “finished its 2025-2026 fiscal year in the black.”

Union College (private liberal arts; New York state) now faces a $12 million budget deficit, due to lower charitable giving as well as an enrollment decline: “Union’s first year class (the class of 2029) has 465 students enrolled, a 110 person decrease from three years ago.”  Projected forward:

Iowa State University‘s (public, land grant) provost recommended closing ten degrees and consolidating thirteen others.  They include undergrad programs in “Bioinformatics and computational biology, Environmental studies, Interdisciplinary design, Religious studies, Women’s and gender studies” as well as grad degrees in “Accounting analytics, Biophysics, Energy systems engineering, Interdisciplinary graduate studies, Toxicology.”

Around a dozen tenured faculty out of 200 at Kenyon College (private, liberal arts; Ohio) took an early retirement offer.  The reason for the campus to make the offer? “Between 2019-20 and 2025-26, there was a 6.5% decline in enrolled Kenyon students, yet an 8% growth in total faculty.”  Note the official projection of enrollment changes and resulting changes to personnel;

The University of North Texas (public, research) offered buyouts to 40 professors in an effort to cut a $45 million deficit.  The savings from that move would mean “UNT does not expect to issue ‘university-wide layoffs.'”  Reasons behind the financial pressure include a decrease in state funding and a decline in international enrollment.

Syracuse University (private, research; New York state) will shut down 93 of its 460  degree offerings.  What kinds of programs?  According to Higher Ed Dive, “41 are bachelor’s degrees, 33 are certificate programs and 19 are graduate degrees.” Which programs?  According to the New York Times, “a spreadsheet provided by the university showed that the humanities and the fine arts represented the largest share.”   The reason given: “program inventory clean-up… the goal of the restructuring was not to cut costs.” Few students are impacted: “only 258 students, of the more than 20,000 at Syracuse, were enrolled in the programs that are ending.” Officially, no job cuts will follow: “no positions had been identified for elimination, the message from the provost said.”

The New School (private research university; New York City) continues to discuss cuts.  A March official blog post described declining enrollment (“approximately 20 percent”) contributing to financial problems, yielding a credit rating downgrade.  That post announced reducing the number of internal colleges to two, reducing the campus physical footprint, voluntary retirements and separations (reducing headcount by 7%), and moving to cut more jobs, both unoccupied and currently staffed.

The Chronicle of Higher Ed then reported seeing an internal email calling for a 15% personnel cut.  A provost and finance vice president wrote: “In certain areas, reductions will primarily affect staff roles; in others, the number of full-time faculty will be adjusted based on closures relating to program scale, demand, and long-term viability.”

The University of Texas-Austin (public research) is closing and moving multiple programs and positions. Programs to be closed and relocated include, according to the AAUP, “African and African Diaspora Studies (AADS); Mexican American and Latina/o Studies (MALS); Women’s, Gender and Sexuality Studies (WGSS); and American Studies departments in the College of Liberal Arts.”  They will appear together instead in “a Social and Cultural Analysis department,” according to the Texas Tribune. Additionally, “UT will separately consolidate Germanic Studies, Slavic and Eurasian Studies, and French and Italian into a new Department of European and Eurasian Studies.” One way cuts might unfold: “The university has begun a curricula review to determine which majors and minors to continue offering under the two consolidated departments.”

Ohio Dominican University missed a bond payment in March. Bloomberg reports the campus suffered a 15% enrollment decline from 2021 to 2025. ODU leaders stated to a local newspaper that:

“There are no discussions about closing the university,” the university said. “Conversely, university trustees and administrators are working diligently to improve operational efficiency, streamline costs in a challenging market for universities nationwide, and assuring a strong path forward for ODU.”

A solid majority of core faculty at Lesley University (private; Massachusetts) voted to strike for better pay and working conditions.  They also seek a particular point in a settlement: “a successorship clause that would retain their union contract in the event of an acquisition or shutdown. ”  The desire for such a clause comes from faculty distrust of the administration, as that Cambridge Somerville Independent article recounts.  We might also consider a turbulent recent history for the campus, as Wikipedia describes:

Janet L. Steinmayer became university president in July 2019. Since 2019, the faculty has passed three no-confidence votes against university leadership… In fall 2023, Lesley laid off 30 faculty members and 20 staff, largely from the undergraduate College of Liberal Arts and Sciences. The university also eliminated some ostensibly low-enrolled academic programs, including all social science majors, and announced an overall restructuring of the university, branded as “Better Lesley.” As of 2024, enrollment had dropped to less than half its 2014 level.

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln (public land grant) cut more than 50 staff and faculty, following the program closures I noted back in February.  The Bugeater, a local AAUP publication, publishes many stories about the human and institutional costs.

Some public institutions are cutting programs because their state governments directed them to.  Ohio, for example, issued orders to its public campuses to close programs by this principle: “Ohio colleges and universities are required to cut any undergraduate degree programs that produce on average less than five degrees annually over a three-year period.” (That local article has helpful lists of programs some institutions have drawn up for closure, far too numerous to repeat here.).

On a related note, Indiana’s governor signed a law requiring that state’s public institutions to close programs whose graduates become “low earners” in their careers.  Higher Ed Dive cites two impacted people to give some examples of how this might play out:

An anthropology student at the University of Indiana Bloomington told the institution’s student newspaper that the bill could pave the way for lawmakers to eliminate his entire department. A lecturer with the university’s Parks, Recreation, and the Outdoors program also noted that state pay for seasonal workers at the Indiana Department of Natural Resources is “notoriously bad,” setting up his program to qualify as low earning.

5 Reflections

This round of cuts, closures, and mergers stems from the classical problems my readers are very familiar with.  All but one are financial in nature, and so many of those occur because of enrollment issues, either flat headcount numbers declining or a reduction in net revenue.  Once again I remind us that the supermajority of American colleges and universities depend on student enrollment to keep the doors open, far more than government funding or the vanishingly few who have the privilege of extreme endowments.

One major reason for those enrollment problems is the decline in the number of international students.  So far I’ve found data on this to vary quite widely, but the direction is fairly clear: fewer foreign students taking classes in the United States, for evident political reasons (the Trump administration; fears of anti-foreigner bias and violence).  We should expect a sequel to this dip in the oncoming fall term, as the politics have not changed.

One reason for those Canadian campus closures and mergers is financial strain caused by a massive decline in international enrollment in that nation, sharper than what the United States has experienced so far.  This might be a salutary experience to monitor for the next few years in America, if the present trend continues. From the Globe and Mail account linked above: “In the past two years, there have been more than 8,000 job losses and more than 600 program suspensions across the college sector in Ontario.”

Another reason for these cuts is politics.  We’ve already noted the Canadian decision to cut international students.  We’ve also noted the Trump administration’s various actions which have reduced that number for this country. I would ask readers to pay attention to Republics in states which they lead, as some are clearly active in trying to reshape their colleges and universities.  I noted Ohio and Indiana up above as two important examples.  In previous posts I’ve pointed to Florida.  In last week’s Future Trends Forum PEN America’s Jonathan Friedman recommended we follow Texas closely:

I’ll add the Republican insistence that foreigners are taking spots which would otherwise have gone to American students doesn’t seem supported by this evidence.

The humanities are well represented among faculty and program cut, but not exclusively so.

Note that job cuts in this post hit all faculty apart from tenured professors.  Note, too, that campuses cut staff across the board, including senior administration.

I can’t help but see these developments as examples of my grim Peak Higher Ed scenario.  Ever since the book came out in January people have been sharing stories, as they see either the whole sector or their part of it in decline.  I would caution readers that this post only touches on cuts etc., not stories of stability or growth.

Summer is nearly upon us, which means campus leaders will be following “melt” (students deciding not to accept their admission after all) closely. Fall enrollment data will be crucial to decision-making. With most students and many faculty stepping back from physical campuses, this is a classic time for administrative actions.  And as the fall midterm elections draw nigh there is plenty of room for state and federal politicking over higher education.

I’ll close with three requests.  First, remember that while I wrote about these stories with an emphasis on statistics and structures, these are all stories about human beings and damages to human lives, from students to staff and faculty.

Second, let me know if these reports are useful. They take quite a bit of effort to compile.

Third, please reach out to me with more stories and evidence of such developments.  Many of you have done so openly (see acknowledgements below). Some prefer to contact me privately, which is understandable in our grim academic climate.  Please DM me on various socials or email me directly right here.

Please take care everyone.  My heart goes out to all students, faculty, and staff hit by these moves or anxious of what might come next.  It’s a rough time.  We should help each other.

(thanks to Any Anderson, Sean Andrews, Karen Bellnier, Kristy Mooney Graves, Nathan Greenfield, Karl Hakkarainen, Robert Kelchen, Steven Landry, Veronica Pejril, Sarah Sangregorio, Peter Shea, Tony Sindelar, Jeffrey Viggiano, Ed Web, Sarah Zee.  Thanks, sympathy, and best wishes to Hampshire College professor Jim Wald.)

*I am delighted in full dad joke mode to note that Mohawk’s mascot is Mo… the hawk.