Saturday, February 9, 2019

Oregon College of Art and Craft Announces Closure


The Board of Trustees for the Oregon College of Art and Craft (OCAC) in Portland, OR announced this last week that they approved a resolution to terminate all degree programs at the end of this academic term. May 19, 2019.

OCAC was founded as the Arts and Crafts Society in 1907.  The name change to Oregon School of Arts and Crafts in 1978.  It became a degree-granting college when the Bachelor of Fine Arts program was added in 1994 and in 1996 the name changed to Oregon College of Art and Craft.
The Oregonian published "Higher education hits low ebb as arts school announces shutdown," with reporting by Jeff Manning that places the OCAC closure within the context of decisions facing other Oregon higher education institutions.

You can read more about the closure at Inside Higher Ed in Scott Jaschik's post, "A Small Art College Will Close," on February 8, 2019.  

Rick Seltzer also authored an interesting post the previous day that provides a broader view of the issues faced in this sector of higher education, "Art School Shakeout: The smallest art colleges are struggling in a fiercely competitive market. Why are they showing such signs of stress? And can larger liberal arts colleges learn from their successes and missteps?"

If you are interested in recent trends for closures, mergers,and acquisitions access College Closures since 2009 in the index at the right of any College History Garden page. There are separate tabs for non-profit closures, for-profit closures, and one for mergers and acquisitions. Each tab includes basic information for the institutions, i.e., Carnegie Classification, sector, accrediting agency, and the IPEDS unitid.

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