Hampshire College, a small liberal arts school in Amherst, announced Tuesday it would be closing its door permanently at the end of the fall semester.
The college has struggled to survive dating back to 2019, when officials announced it was seeking a strategic partner to help stay afloat. Despite efforts to raise more money and boost enrollment, the financial pressures became too much for Hampshire to endure.
"Hampshire's board made this decision only after exploring every possible alternative," said Jose Fuentes, Chair of the Hampshire College Board of Trustees in a statement issued Tuesday morning. “The financial realities we face: declining enrollment, the weight of long-standing debt, and stalled progress on land development left us no other responsible path.”
The news comes as the New England Commission of Higher Education demanded the college prove that it should keep its accreditation.
“The news that Hampshire College will close at the end of this calendar year comes after more than five decades of the College providing students with a unique, interdisciplinary, self-directed liberal arts education that will undoubtedly have a lasting impact,” said Commissioner of Higher Education Noe Ortega in a prepared statement.
Ortega said the commission recognizes "how deeply impactful this closure is for the entire Hampshire community, especially for students who must now determine their path forward."
Economic Development Impact
Amherst Town Manager Paul Bockelman, who attended Hampshire College, said the economic impacts of losing the school will be significant. He said it starts with the loss of about 200 jobs in the town and goes beyond that.
"All of the things the college does — [from] buying food at Atkins Market to being downtown and supporting our local businesses — that will all have significant impacts for the town," he said.
There's also the question as to what will become of the Hampshire campus — which Bockelman said sits at about 600 acres in South Amherst. He said the town will work with the college on that front and will chime in when appropriate.
Bockelman also said he expects a community driven conversation, but speculated the other colleges in the area, UMass Amherst, Amherst College, Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley and Smith College in Northampton may have an interest. Those four schools along with Hampshire are part of a consortium known as the Five Colleges.
Former students and faculty reflect on their Hampshire experiences
Bockelman said it helped shape his values and allowed him to make lifelong friends along the way. He also pointed to Hampshire's unique academic approach.
"You know, I had such a fondness for the institution because I believed in the values that it brought and how they looked at education, which was wholly different from any other institution in the country," he said.
Perhaps the college's most famous alumni, filmmaker Ken Burns, class of 1971, issued a statement on the announcement Tuesday.
"Hampshire College is woven into the very fabric of who I am. It's where I learned that there is freedom in searching, and even in failure. I learned to use that freedom to question everything, and ultimately to find my voice as a storyteller in a way that would have been inconceivable at a conventional institution," he said.
He credited the college's current president Jennifer Chrisler, for her leadership.
"Jennifer led this community with uncommon grace, care, and determination. I witnessed her fierceness firsthand, along with the potent and abiding zeal of students, faculty, and alumni who fought to preserve Hampshire's independence at every turn. This is an incalculable loss, the reverberations of which will be felt in ways none of us can imagine," he said.
Former Hampshire College administrator Salman Hameed, Ph.D, said he loved working with Hampshire College students, especially with a classroom model that did not require grading.
"Having them in the class, the kind of interactions you would get... you don't have a problem of them not contributing to the discussion because they would. In fact, we had the opposite problem of how to control it," he said laughing. "They would not be shy in raising controversial issues or opinions that other people think, 'should we bring it up?' because they are not worried about the grade in the first place. They are like, okay, this is my opinion. I'm going to say that."
What lies ahead
Students on track to complete their degrees by the end of Fall, 2026, will have the opportunity to do so, while still being able to live on campus. Hampshire is working with the state department of higher education and the New England Commission of Higher Education to assist all others. The statement says those students will receive “individualized advising and transfer pathways” to partner institutions. Those include Amherst, Mount Holyoke and Smith Colleges and UMass Amherst.
Some faculty and staff members will remain on board through the end of the fall semester. It is anticipated that layoffs will begin June 15, with workforce reductions taking place in waves. Employees will begin to be notified of their status starting next week.
Hampshire College was founded in 1965 and admitted its first class five years later. It has taken an alternative method to higher education: Allowing students to choose their own pathway through college while using a grading system that does not include grade point averages while using other evaluation methods besides letter grades.
The announcement came as many smaller colleges and universities have closed or downsized in recent years amid financial strain.
This is a developing story. NEPM’s Jill Kaufman and Monte Belmonte and GBH's Kirk Carapezza contributed to this report.
Disclosure: NEPM has a partnership with the Five Colleges, which includes Hampshire College. This does not effect how we cover the news.
