College Town editor Brian Bergstein and I discuss this conundrum often. On the one hand, I completely understand Shulman’s desire to avoid exacerbating a school’s problems by deterring students from attending. But as a journalist, I also feel that students, parents, and employees deserve to know whether schools are in trouble.

The stakes are too high — research shows that students at shuttered colleges are less likely to ever complete a degree. College closures also put faculty and other employees in a terrible position because there is usually not enough funding for severance after creditors are paid.

More than two dozen colleges in New England have closed since 2015, and almost all of them enrolled new students shortly before announcing their closures. Parents and faculty members from shuttered campuses have told me about the supposed reassurances they received from school administrators before the end came.

Colleges are required to post annual financial statements online, so one might think that it would be easy enough to identify a school in trouble. I am here to tell you that it is not so easy.

A college’s net assets may increase from one year to the next, but that does not necessarily mean all is well. On the other hand, a one-time operating deficit is not necessarily a crisis. Prospective students and their families do not have the time and the know-how to pore over institutional finances during the already complicated and stressful process of applying to college.

Unfortunately, as I mentioned in last week’s newsletter, too many college leaders and board members are in denial about just how shaky their school’s finances are and remain overly optimistic that a surge in enrollment or a major gift is just around the corner.

It seems to me that higher ed is lacking transparency during a critical moment for the sector. Not only would honest conversations about institutional finances allow students and families to make better-informed decisions, but a clearer picture of college finances could spur regulators, alumni, or donors to step up and help a college raise funds, push leaders to find a peer institution willing to acquire their school, or even encourage the state or business community to help in creative ways.

As I look at the state’s private colleges, I see three that should be screaming for help, and yet their leaders seem reluctant to admit there is a problem. These schools are drawing unsustainable amounts from their endowments to cover expenses and posted double-digit enrollment losses in recent years.

None of these schools’ destinies are predetermined, but history tells us that the boards of these schools need to take bold action soon.

Lesley University: Sitting on some of the most attractive real estate in the country, just down the road from the world’s top universities in Cambridge, Lesley has been stumbling from one disaster to the next in recent years.

Enrollment at Lesley dropped by more than 57 percent between 2014 and 2024 to about 2,550 students, prompting faculty layoffs and a major restructuring plan that did not go over well with either students or faculty.

Affiliates of the school tell me with sadness that Lesley, which was founded in the early 1900s to educate generations of teachers, has lost its way. Earlier this year S&P lowered its rating on Lesley’s debt to BBB-, the tier just above junk-bond status, which will make it more expensive for the school to borrow money in the future. S&P said its analysts expect that Lesley’s enrollment will continue to be a problem.

The school’s president since 2019, Janet Steinmayer, departed earlier this year after a tumultuous tenure — the university’s faculty voted no confidence in her leadership several times. Joanne Kossuth, previously Lesley’s chief operations officer, has been interim president since July 1.

The school says it has been working to address its challenges by improving its campus, adding new programs, including a Center for Psychedelic Healing and Psychotherapies, and expanding internship opportunities for students. Kossuth wrote in a statement that she believes Lesley “exemplifies the adaptability that higher education institutions need to meet changing student needs and prepare for the future.”

“We continue to invest in our students, our faculty and Lesley’s future,” Kossuth said. “Our operating picture is stable, our endowment is strong, and trends in new student enrollment and degree completion across our key programs is aligned with our goals.”

American International College: AIC’s safety net is disappearing. The school in Springfield withdrew more than $6 million from its endowment in the fiscal year ending in 2024, and more than $9 million in the 2025 fiscal year. That leaves less than $1 million in unrestricted funds left for the school to use to cover operations.

Those are eye-popping numbers for a school with a modest endowment — the total value has fallen from about $30.4 million at the beginning of 2024 to $22.6 million at the end of 2025.

The good news is that after years of steep enrollment declines — a 42 percent drop between 2010 and 2024 — the numbers of undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral students are rising. Enrollment is up for the fall by about 300 students from a year ago, according to the school, to a total of 2,185 students.

But there is a warning sign in this, too. The college has been steeply discounting tuition, which has taken a toll on revenue. In 2025 the college brought in about $18,000 per student after financial aid and scholarships, despite estimating on its website that it costs more than $66,000 per year for a student to attend.

In response, AIC has been cutting costs, including recently eliminating six administrative positions. The college says it is also redesigning programs including its MBA and expanding opportunities for high school students to take courses for credit.

But are the changes enough?

The school was founded in 1885 to educate French Canadian immigrants and their families during a time of prejudice and limited educational opportunities for those communities. Today more than a third of its undergrads are the first in their families to attend college.

It would be tragic if these students were stranded by a closure, so I recently asked AIC leadership if the school was in talks with Springfield College down the street about a merger. The answer was no. The school declined to make its president, Nicolle Cestero, available for an interview.

Denise Vozella, AIC’s spokesperson, says the school has improved its financial position since the large endowment withdrawals. She says it continues to meet its payroll and other financial obligations and is “encouraged by recent momentum in enrollment, philanthropy, competitive grant funding, and academic innovation.”

For example, the school recently received $375,000 from the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, a quasi-public economic development agency. To me, this is even more reason for AIC to share with the public its plans to remain solvent. AIC needs to call Springfield College pronto.

Dean College: What was for decades a two-year school in Franklin, Dean College started offering bachelor’s degrees in the 1990s. But the school has struggled to differentiate itself in a crowded marketplace in recent years.

Enrollment was down more than 13 percent between 2010 and 2024, and the school lacks substantial revenue sources beyond undergraduate tuition, so even modest enrollment declines are painful to the bottom line.

The college’s board has been approving special appropriations from the endowment to cover expenses, including a $3.9 million withdrawal in 2026. The total value of Dean’s endowment shrunk slightly in 2025 to about $66.2 million. The school is also discounting tuition significantly; its 1,092 students paid an average of roughly $33,200 each in tuition, fees, and room and board in fiscal 2025 even though the total cost of attendance listed on the school’s website is $73,972.

Dean has strong connections to the local community and sits at a commuter rail stop, so hopefully the college can find a way to increase its revenue sources and lower its expenses in short order. The college has runway to linger for a while, but is that in the best interest of students?

A spokesperson for Dean declined to make an official available and declined to comment.

We all know it’s hard times for small colleges right now, but it’s also exciting to think about the reinvention and creativity that’s possible across the sector. We may see surprising turnarounds and shakeups. I have my own suggestion for how colleges around the region could build something new together. More on that next week.

In the meantime, you can join the conversation in the comments below.

✍ Vincent F. Hendricks, philosophy professor at the University of Copenhagen, says AI is one reason that higher ed’s suckers are getting hustled.

✍️ Harvard psychology professor Steven Pinker is back with two ways campuses can improve discourse and their reputations.

Be sure to check out the print edition of the Globe this coming Sunday, Sept. 13. College Town will be taking over the Ideas section.

Do you have a submission or tip you’d like to send? Our inbox is open at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

欄 MGH Institute rebrands: The MGH Institute of Health Professions in Charlestown, a university that sits within the Mass General Brigham health system, is getting a makeover. As of Sept. 1, the school changed its name to the Mass General Brigham University of Health Professions, which the school’s new president, Deborah Jones, tells me better reflects the school’s ambitions to “help the health care system build a workforce of the future.” Jones, a critical care nurse herself, says students benefit from an education that is closely connected to clinical innovations and to the changing needs of patients. Jones says the university will be working closely with clinical partners to quickly develop new certificate programs that meet the health care industry’s workforce needs.

 Higher ed’s political problems: Researchers at the Radcliffe Institute at Harvard plan to study how faculty and students across a wide range of fields and institutions balance their personal political values and their scholarly pursuits. This will be timely research given the repeated critiques that higher ed has become too political. These arguments are usually based on anecdotal evidence because no data exist to support or debunk the critique.

“There’s a lot of questions that people have across the political spectrum about what politicization of higher education entails,” says Neil Gross, sociology professor at Colby College and a research lead at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. “We’re hoping to provide answers that everyone, regardless of their position, can feel confident about.”

 Spelman College, a historically Black college known for the liberal arts in Atlanta, has turned to Ayanna Howard, a roboticist who is also an expert in artificial intelligence, to chart the school’s future.

I recently caught up with Howard while she was on a fund-raising trip to Martha’s Vineyard to ask about her plans. She also shared some advice for New England’s higher ed leaders.

Read our full conversation here.

Have suggestions for other higher ed movers and shakers I should interview? Send them my way at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

 Boston Magazine poses the question of whether college in Boston is still worth it.

 My Globe colleagues Brooke Hauser and Michaela Towfighi write about students paying big money to decorate their dorm rooms. I guess this means the highlighter pink and orange duvets from Target’s 2010 collection are out.

 The Houston Chronicle writes about the impressive enrollment growth at Rice University and probes whether the private campus can maintain its tight-knit culture.

Student journalism spotlight

✍️ The Daily Californian at UC Berkeley reports on an intriguing battle brewing over whether public universities have to reveal how much they’re paying student athletes.

Brian Rosenberg wrote in Globe Ideas about how the death of a small college is devastating not only for its students and faculty but also for its surrounding community.

Dr. Melissa Gilliam, the president of Boston University, will be a featured speaker at the Globe’s annual Future of Medicine Summit on Tuesday, Sept. 15, at Harvard Medical School in Boston. College Town editor Brian Bergstein will be leading a conversation with Gilliam about BU’s efforts to accelerate breakthroughs in biomedical research.

As a College Town subscriber, you can use the code GLOBE50 for 50% off tickets while they’re available. Register now at globe.com/futureofmedicine.

What was the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s original name?

A. Massachusetts Agricultural College

B. Massachusetts State College

C. University of Massachusetts

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. your answers, or tune in next week for the answer.

Last week’s trivia answer: Harvard relocated to Concord after the Continental Army occupied Cambridge in 1775.

Hilary Burns can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..