The University of the Arts is closing June 7, its president says

In an abrupt and stunning development in Philadelphia’s higher education market, the University of the Arts in Philadelphia is planning to close its doors for good on June 7, president Kerry Walk said Friday evening.

The Middle States Commission on Higher Education, its accrediting agency, reported that the school with nearly 150-year-old roots notified the agency of its imminent closure on Wednesday, the same day it started a summer term. It comes following a precipitous decline in enrollment and a severe cash flow problem that had been building over time, according to Walk.

The commission said the university is out of compliance with all standards and, in an unusually swift action, it will withdraw certification from the university on Saturday. It’s a blow to the higher education community in the region, having just watched Cabrini University close its doors, but after giving its students a year’s notice. University of the Arts students are getting but a week.

» READ MORE: UArts faculty reach tentative agreement on first contract in school’s history

As of early Friday evening, staff and students hadn’t been notified.

“The halls are quiet, the kids are gone,” said one staffer, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of reprisal. “They haven’t told us anything.”

The commission noted in its documents that the university failed to inform the commission of the closure in a timely manner or plan for proper closure, including a teach-out plan to make sure students’ education can continue.

The university, the commission said, must immediately notify its community of the impending closure.

Walk, who became president less than a year ago, said early Friday evening that the university was in the process of communicating with its students, faculty, and staff about its plans. An email to them went out from Walk and the head of the board of trustees shortly before 8 p.m., saying they had taken steps to try to avoid such an abrupt closure but were unsuccessful.

“Unfortunately, however, we could not overcome the ultimate challenge we faced: with a cash position that has steadily weakened, we could not cover significant, unanticipated expenses,” they wrote, noting that town hall meetings would be held Monday for students, faculty, and staff. “The situation came to light very suddenly. Despite swift action, we were unable to bridge the necessary gaps.”

Walk did not specify what those unanticipated expenses were or say in dollars how big the cash flow problem is.

The university employs just under 700 faculty and staff, who ultimately will be out of work.

“We will have a small team wind down our operations and more importantly ensure our students are on a pathway to complete their degrees at our partner institutions and also to ensure we are able to support our faculty and staff through this difficult, indeed devastating, transition,” Walk said in an interview. “We find ourselves in this heartbreaking situation that is unimaginable to all of us and extremely difficult for all of us who love this very, very special university community.”

She said the university had developed partnerships with Drexel, Temple, and Moore College of Art & Design to ease the transition for students. More details of those partnerships were not immediately available.

The university’s board of trustees is meeting Saturday morning to decide next steps, she said. Walk said she’s not sure if classes will be held next week; they were held Friday.

The news stunned the university community.

Emerson Tobia graduated from AIM Academy, a private school in Montgomery County, on Friday morning. His family was still in celebration mode when they learned that the school he planned to attend in the fall was closing.

The family “knew nothing,” said Peter Tobia, Emerson’s father. “I called the head of the Game Art program, and he didn’t even know.”

Emerson attended an event at University of the Arts recently: Peter Tobia had talked to a financial aid representative from the school.

“There wasn’t any news about this being a possibility,” Tobia said. “This is crazy.”

Daniel J. Pieczkolon, president of a labor union that represents University of Arts faculty and staff, expressed disappointment in the university’s communication to faculty, staff, and students.

”They’ve made no communication to the union about even the possibility of this,” said Pieczkolon, who leads United Academics of Philadelphia.

The faculty unit with about 250 members approved their first contract during the winter. A separate unit for staff, with about 100 members, has been negotiating for almost a year but still doesn’t have a contract, said Pieczkolon, who teaches at Arcadia University.

Walk said the university had been struggling for a while, and like many colleges post-pandemic, had lost significant enrollment. This fall the school opened with 1,149 students, down from 2,038 in 2013, she said.

Complicating the matter is that the university is a specially focused arts institution which means there are fewer students talented enough to be admitted, and that’s a harder proposition among a shrinking number of high school students nationwide, she said.

Walk said she first became aware of a significant cash flow problem on May 14 and that it quickly became apparent that the problem was even bigger than originally thought.

“We had unanticipated expenses we had to cover with cash,” she said. “At the same time, some of the deposits [including gifts, grants, and other revenue] we expected into that bank account were late and just didn’t come in.”

The school told bondholders in a filing last fall that total enrollment fell to 1,207 in the current school year from 1,914 in 2018-19. The freshman class this year was 250, a big increase from 182 the year before but still far less than the typical first-year enrollment of more than 400 in the years before the pandemic.

UArts had an operating loss of $12 million on total revenue of $63 million in the fiscal year that ended June 30, according to its audited financial statement.

Fitch Ratings downgraded the University of that Arts’ credit rating in January to the extremely low level of B+, saying it expected the university’s revenue to be challenged for years to come despite an increase in the size of the freshman class last fall.

State Rep. Ben Waxman (D., Phila.) said he was “profoundly disappointed and frustrated” by the closure of a school he said “has been a cornerstone of creativity and culture in Center City Philadelphia for generations.” Waxman, in a statement, said the school’s closure “is a significant setback and not only a devastating blow to our local community, but also a significant setback for the arts and education in our city at large. It is unacceptable that such a cornerstone of our cultural and educational landscape has shut its doors in such an abrupt and shocking manner.”

Waxman said he believed an independent investigation should be conducted into the closure.

The school traces its roots to 1876, but was created by the 1985 merger of the Philadelphia College of Art and the Philadelphia College of the Performing Arts; it gained university status, and its current name, in 1987. The university has many notable alumni including Michael Novak, the artistic director of the Paul Taylor Dance Company, one of the best modern dance companies in the world.

The closure comes less than four months after the faculty and administration reached a tentative agreement after more than three years of negotiation on the first contract in the school’s history. Less than a year ago, the university welcomed Walk, formerly president of Marymount Manhattan College, as its new president.

The news of UArts’ closure comes less than a year after the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts had announced that it was eliminating its bachelor’s and master’s of fine arts programs. PAFA developed “personalized transfer plans” for students to other local universities so they could complete their studies.

One of those schools designated as a transfer partner is University of the Arts.

Editor’s note: This article was updated with financial results for fiscal 2023 and enrollment data for the 2023-24 school year. The Inquirer previously reported that those documents had not been filed.

Staff writers Ellen Dunkel and Peter Dobrin contributed to this article.