A financially struggling private liberal arts college in western Massachusetts announced Tuesday that it will close this year.
The Hampshire College Board of Trustees took a “painful” vote to close the school in Amherst after the fall 2026 semester, the board and President Jennifer Chrisler said in a message. Hampshire College has been struggling financially for years and nearly closed in 2019.
“As President Chrisler has shared regularly with our community and our regulatory agencies, we worked aggressively to increase enrollment, refinance existing debt, and realize new revenue via the sale of a portion of our land,” the message said. “We have long known that addressing these issues is essential to establishing a stable financial foundation, supporting long-term operations, and meeting regulatory requirements. We are faced with the clear, heartbreaking reality that progress on each of these three key factors has fallen far short of what we had hoped.”
Hampshire College joins a wave of more than 30 New England colleges that have closed or merged in the last decade. Anna Maria College in Paxton is also experiencing financial difficulties and is at risk of shuttering.
Hampshire College plans to use its limited financial resources to help students finish their degrees or transfer to peer schools, Chrisler and the board said. Hampshire is part of the Five College Consortium, which also includes Amherst College, Mount Holyoke College, Smith College and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
The Department of Higher Education has been in “close contact” with Chrisler and is committed to supporting students, faculty and staff, Commissioner Noe Ortega said.
“We recognize how deeply impactful this closure is for the entire Hampshire community, especially for students who must now determine their path forward,” Ortega said in a statement. “We urge students to make full use of the supports that Hampshire is offering to guide those decisions and find the best path to completing their academic journey. We appreciate Hampshire’s student-centered approach to date on contingency planning, and we encourage their continued partnership with DHE, aimed at ensuring students receive the benefits of completing their education in a timely manner.”
The small private, liberal arts college has existed in Amherst since 1965 as an alternative to traditional higher education. Students design their own programs of study, without traditional majors or departments. Filmmaker Ken Burns is a Hampshire alumnus who’s been heavily involved in fundraising efforts to save the school.
Enrollment at Hampshire College has declined dramatically in the last decade. According to U.S. Department of Education data, the college had 1,410 students in 2015, which dipped all the way down to 472 in 2021 amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Though enrollment bounced back slightly in the years since, the school is once again experiencing a decline and this year has 750 students.
As enrollment has wobbled, tuition has increased. Between last school year and this year, tuition rose from $59,366 to $62,928 per student, and housing costs doubled to over $10,000.
In 2019, the New England Commission on Higher Education asked the college to “show cause” why it should not be placed on probation or have its accreditation withdrawn. The response was a five-year financial plan, which included steps to operate as a smaller college, raise $60 million, and “restructure and financially reinvigorate the college,” its president said at the time.
In its message Tuesday, Hampshire College wrote that financial pressures had become “increasingly complex.”
“The inability to substantially grow enrollment would mean extraordinary cuts to our operating budgets to educate the student body we can reasonably anticipate,” Chrisler and the board wrote. “Additionally, the degree of short-term debt tied to our land assets means that even a favorable sale would not change our long-term financial trajectory given current enrollment.”
Alison Kuznitz and Sam Drysdale are reporters for State House News Service and State Affairs Pro Massachusetts. Reach them at akuznitz@stateaffairs.com and sdrysdale@statehousenews.com.
