Valley Forge is the seventh school to announce plans to shut this 12 months.
Strapped for money and beneath scrutiny from its accreditor, College of Valley Forge officers introduced this week that the small, non-public establishment will shut after the summer season semester.
The transfer comes roughly a month earlier than the Pennsylvania college’s subsequent educational 12 months was set to start.
“After a lot prayer, cautious consideration, and session, the Board of Trustees of the College of Valley Forge has made the tough and painful resolution to droop educational operations on the conclusion of the Summer season 2026 semester,” trustees wrote in a press release.
The Board of Trustees wrote within the Wednesday announcement that the choice adopted “in depth efforts to deal with the College’s monetary challenges, pursue strategic partnerships, and establish sustainable paths ahead.” However in the end the challenges proved insurmountable.
The closure of the 87-year-old college comes simply over a month after UVF’s accreditor, the Center States Fee on Larger Schooling, positioned it on present trigger standing. The accreditor famous final month it had considerations about Valley Forge’s monetary stability and governance and requested it to show enough assets and a long-term monetary plan.
As a substitute, the college will shut earlier than the following educational 12 months. The transfer was preceded by years of declining enrollment. Whereas Valley Forge has hovered between 500 and 600 college students in recent times, its head rely was just below 900 in fall 2016, in keeping with federal enrollment knowledge.
As enrollment dwindled, so did the college’s funds. Publicly accessible monetary paperwork present that Valley Forge has been working with a persistent deficit for a lot of the final decade.
The newest accessible paperwork present a college with minimal belongings, important debt and a meager and closely restricted endowment. Valley Forge’s endowment was final valued in public paperwork at $2.8 million, although the college had borrowed closely from these funds. Monetary paperwork present the college owed $1.7 million to its endowment from a previous mortgage.
However warning indicators about Valley Forge’s monetary precarity had been seen for years.
The U.S. Division of Schooling initially positioned Valley Forge on heightened money monitoring standing in 2015, which requires better federal oversight of college funds. Though Valley Forge was faraway from HCM standing in 2017, it was once more hit with that designation in early 2021 and required to position $635,014 into an account with the division to make sure entry to federal monetary help after ED decided Valley Forge didn’t meet its monetary accountability metrics. The college has remained on heightened money monitoring since then.
Valley Forge is one among a number of establishments to announce plans to shut this 12 months and the primary in Pennsylvania—a state that has misplaced a number of schools in recent times. (Extra closures are forward as Pennsylvania State College plans to shutter seven Commonwealth Campuses in 2027.)
Different nonprofit schools which have introduced closures this 12 months embody:
