We learned on April 14th that Hampshire College will soon bring to 33 the number of small liberal arts colleges that have closed in New England over the past decade. As reported in Part 1 of this series on the possible future for the Simon’s Rock’s campus, sales of college properties can be years-long, messy processes, with a huge mismatch between the hoped-for sale price and the real-world sale price. Examples in this vein include the College of Saint Rose, Green Mountain College, Marlboro College, and Southern Vermont College.
There are college campus sales that have gone well, too.
Positive outcomes resulted, in the cases of Newbury and Mount Ida Colleges described below, from proximity to an urban center. In the case of today’s third example, my own alma mater, Vermont College of Fine Arts, success was due to a unique combination of factors, including a municipality and civic infrastructure with the capacity set up to step in and help, a town that could use a performing arts cente…
