Hampshire College, a private college located in Amherst, Massachusetts, announced on April 14, 2026, that it was joining the list of small, experimental liberal arts colleges that have closed their doors over the past few years.

Hampshire will cease operations in December 2026 because of “declining enrollment, the weight of long-standing debt, and stalled progress on land development,” Hampshire board chair Jose Fuentes said in a statement. Hampshire currently enrolls 625 students, about half the number who attended in the early 2000s.

Recently admitted Hampshire students will receive a refund on their deposit. Hampshire’s current students completing their final capstone project can still graduate from the school. Other enrolled students can transfer to another school in Massachusetts that is part of the Five College Consortium. Amherst College, where I teach law, is part of this consortium. This arrangement allows students from participating colleges to take classes on different campuses.

As someone who has taught many Hampshire students, I can attest that the college delivered an education that lived up to its motto, “Non Satis Scire,” meaning “To Know Is Not Enough.”

I have also written about the financial dilemmas liberal arts colleges are facing, as enrollment drops, finances are strained and they are pressured to adopt vocational programs.

Hampshire’s demise is another sign of the consolidation occurring in higher education, in which wealthy schools and those that deliver a traditional and often vocationally driven curriculum have an advantage. Meanwhile, dozens of small colleges with small endowments, like Hampshire, cannot keep up.

A growing list of shuttered liberal arts schools

Founded in 1965, Hampshire billed itself as a school that “scrapped generic models of learning” and offered a student-driven........

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