AURORA, N.Y. — Citing financial difficulties, Wells College on Monday announced plans to close at the end of this academic semester. Wells College is located in the village of Aurora in Cayuga County on the eastern side of Cayuga Lake. “As trustees, we have a fiduciary responsibility to the institution; we have determined after a […]
AURORA, N.Y. — Citing financial difficulties, Wells College on Monday announced plans to close at the end of this academic semester.
Wells College is located in the village of Aurora in Cayuga County on the eastern side of Cayuga Lake.
“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 on Monday.
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.”
Carroll and Gibralter lauded the work of Wells College board members, leaders, faculty, staff, and graduates on creating strategic plans, handling fundraising campaigns, launching new programs, and managing the school’s resources “with care.”
“But revenues, unfortunately, are not projected to be sufficient for Wells’ long-term financial stability,” they 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.
The college’s 156th and final commencement ceremony is set for the morning of May 18.
Wells College was founded in 1868 by Henry Wells, who was one of the founders of the American Express Company and Wells Fargo & Company.
Wells Seminary, as it was originally called, had an original goal “to educate women who would further society’s “intellectual culture” as wives and mothers,” a mission that evolved as the campus grew, per the history page on the Wells College website.