(File Photo: Source for Photo: FILE – The Nittany Lion logo taken before an NCAA college football game between Penn State and Delaware, Sept. 9, 2023, in State College, Pa. (AP Photo/Barry Reeger, File)
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Penn State University’s trustees voted Thursday night to close seven of its 19 branch campuses amid declining enrollments, demographic shifts and financial pressures that backers say made it a necessary decision.
The 25-8 vote by the trustees came after a nearly two-hour public meeting that was streamed live online, and after hours of closed-door debate between the trustees.
Even after the closures, Penn State said it will continue to have the largest statewide footprint of any university in the Big Ten and any land-grant institution in the United States.
The campuses to close — Dubois, Fayette, Mont Alto, New Kensington, Shenango, Wilkes-Barre, and York — together are enrolling slightly over 3,000 students this year, or less than 4% of Penn State students, according to Penn State data. Branch campuses collectively have about 23,000 students, and the seven to be closed are among the smallest in terms of enrollment.
No campus will close before the end of the 2026-27 academic year and, under the plan, every student who begins a degree at a closing campus will have the opportunity to complete their degree at Penn State.
Penn State’s president, Neeli Bendapudi, said in a livestreamed address after the trustees’ meeting that Penn State — like every other U.S. higher education institution — is navigating a difficult and complex reality because of declining birth rates and declining college enrollments nationwide.
The campuses were built to serve a Pennsylvania that looked very different than it does today, during the Great Depression before demographic declines and modern transportation, Bendapudi said.
Closing the campuses will allow Penn State to be “more strategic and more forward-looking” in the school’s land-grant mission, Bendapudi said.
Opponents warned that the vote was premature, that affected communities hadn’t been adequately consulted and that the trustees were acting without complete information on the most important vote they’ll make as trustees.
“It will be the most impactful vote we will ever make on this board. It will impact this university long beyond our years,” trustee Anthony Lubrano said during the meeting. Lubrano voted against it.
Criticism also has poured in from state lawmakers who represent areas that are home to a closing campus and who vote annually to send hundreds of millions of dollars to Penn State to subsidize tuition for in-state students.
Trustee Matthew McGloin — a former Penn State quarterback — told fellow trustees that he struggled with the decision, but decided to vote for it because it provided a responsible path forward for the greater good of the Penn State system.
Bendapudi announced in February that an internal team would study which campuses to close and make a recommendation to the board.
Bendapudi has said Penn State tried to save the campuses, but enrollments are declining at most branch campuses and their surrounding populations are projected to continue declining.
Historically, the smaller campuses draw most of their students from their local area, and it’s not realistic to recruit from elsewhere to buttress those enrollments, Bendapudi said.
