Penn State board backs plan to close 7 campuses, saying low enrollment, financials leave no other choice

[FakeNoose]

Spotlight PA link: https://www.spotlightpa.org/statecollege/2025/05/penn-state-commonwealth-campus-closure-vote/

Penn State’s Board of Trustees approved the closure of seven campuses Thursday, putting into motion a process that will impact thousands of students and more than 500 employees.

Citing declining enrollments and financial challenges, the university will close the DuBois, Fayette, Mont Alto, New Kensington, Shenango, Wilkes-Barre, and York locations after May 2027.

Ahead of the vote, President Neeli Bendapudi told the board that closing the locations was a strategic and humane decision.

“We are spreading our students, faculty, and staff so thin that we jeopardize the quality of education and the support that we can offer,” Bendapudi said. “We are subsidizing decline at the expense of growth.”

The board passed the president’s closure plan by a vote of 25 to 8.

- more at link -

This comes as no surprise to anyone who's been following the PSU news in the past several months.

[bucolic_frolic]

1. Is it also the case that other satellite and evening education programs

have sprung up in more populated areas? I don't follow it, but thought I saw ads here or there.

Maybe competition from private colleges too? Just about all have an evening, weekend, graduate program now, chasing the money.

Is it simply young people wanting to flee unexciting areas for cities, more fertile grounds?

[belpejic]

2. Starting to see the results of declining population growth

Certain colleges and universities will remain ultra-competitive, but ones on the margin, especially in more rural areas, are really going to suffer. Sadly, communities around them will suffer as well, since these institutions provide big boosts to local economies.

[Deminpenn]

3. Branch campuses used to just be 2 year pit stops

before students went to University Park. Students could get the basic freshman and sophomore courses in, then continue their major at UP. The only exceptions were Behrend in Erie and, iirc, Mount Alto which offered 4 year degrees.

That worked fine, saved students money by allowing them to live at home and commute. The curriculum was also consistent among the branches. But then Penn State decided to offer 4 year degrees at all the branches which of course required more course offering, more professors and more expense. PSU tried to be everything to everyone. That was the big mistake that has led to the new branch closures.

Here in western PA, the campuses that are closing are in close proximity to each other and enrolling only a couple hundred students. For example, the Shenango campus is only about 20 miles from PSU Beaver and will be an easy commute.

I will say, as an alum, that Penn State got too smug and arrogant about itself and that's why it's in a financial bind now.

[FakeNoose]

4. Two of my siblings did exactly that back in the 1980's

A sister and a brother of mine started at Behrendt College in Erie for their first 2 years, then transferred to the main campus in Happy Valley for their final years and degrees. Behrendt was an early "feeder" school before PSU developed its full program across the state. Eventually Behrendt College began offering 4 year degree programs of its own, so I guess it's not considered a feeder school any more. I'm not sure since I haven't followed their story after my sibs moved on.

[Deminpenn]

5. That was the norm

when I applied in the 70s. Most kids started at a branch, spent their first 2 years there, then went to Main Campus. It was more likely than not that students applying for admission to University Park as their first choice were rejected and assigned to their second choice of a branch campus.