AURORA — Wells College, which has operated in Aurora on the eastern side of Cayuga Lake for 156 years, will soon be closing. Citing financial difficulties, the Cayuga County school on April 29 announced plans to close at the end of this academic semester. “As trustees, we have a fiduciary responsibility to the institution; we […]
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AURORA — Wells College, which has operated in Aurora on the eastern side of Cayuga Lake for 156 years, will soon be closing. Citing financial difficulties, the Cayuga County school on April 29 announced plans to close at the end of this academic semester. “As trustees, we have a fiduciary responsibility to the institution; we have determined after a thorough review that the College does not have adequate financial resources to continue,” Marie Chapman Carroll, chair of the Wells College board of trustees, and Jonathan Gibralter, president of Wells College, said in a letter posted on the school’s website. The college’s 156th and final commencement ceremony is set for the morning of May 18. It’ll be the second prominent private Central New York college to close in the last year, following the closure of Cazenovia College on June 30, 2023. The Wells College letter went on to acknowledge that many small colleges like Wells have faced “enormous financial challenges,” which have been “exacerbated” by the global pandemic, a shrinking pool of undergraduate students nationwide, inflationary pressures, and an “overall negative sentiment towards higher education.” “But revenues, unfortunately, are not projected to be sufficient for Wells’ long-term financial stability,” Carroll and Gibralter said. Wells College says it has reached an agreement with Manhattanville University in Westchester County to become the school’s “preferred teach-out partner,” helping to “ensure that Wells’ current students matriculate and our institutional mission and legacy continue.” A teach-out agreement is a contract between schools that will allow students to finish their program of study at one or more schools, per the federal government’s website dedicated to federal student aid. “We have developed additional teach-out agreements with these other teach-out partners: Excelsior University, Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Keuka College, Le Moyne College, Mercy University, SUNY Brockport,” the Wells officials said in the letter. Wells College says it has created a website which lists additional information. “We will continue to update this website and communicate with our stakeholders as we finalize plans for the closure of Wells,” per the letter.