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The 27 colleges cannot be identified from the published analysis: Education Next reports results for a group of West Coast institutions but does not provide their names or explain why the list is absent. More importantly, the article does not say that each college is forecasting a deficit. It models how long their cash might last under specified assumptions—a measure of liquidity risk, not a confirmed institutional forecast or a prediction of closure.
Which 27 colleges are in the analysis?
The publication does not identify them. Steven M. Shulman and Michael B. Horn say they applied their analysis to 27 West Coast schools with profiles similar to a group of 44 private, tuition-dependent New England schools enrolling 1,000 to 8,000 students. They report aggregate results for the West Coast group, not a school-by-school list. The article gives no stated reason for omitting the names.
The 44 New England institutions are named, but they are not the West Coast 27. Those New England schools are American International, Assumption, Babson, Bates, Bay Path, Bentley, Bryant, Champlain, Clark, Colby, Colby-Sawyer, Connecticut College, Curry, Emerson, Emmanuel, Endicott, Fairfield, Gordon, Holy Cross, Husson, Johnson & Wales, Lasell, Lesley, Merrimack, Middlebury, Mount Holyoke, New England College, Norwich, Our Lady of the Elms, Providence, Quinnipiac, RISD, Rivier, Roger Williams, Sacred Heart, Saint Anselm, Saint Michael’s, Salve Regina, Springfield, Stonehill, Suffolk, Trinity, University of New England, and Wheaton. None should be presented as members of the unnamed West Coast group.
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That wording goes beyond what the article establishes. The authors analyze published financial statements and estimate “staying power”: how long available cash could support ordinary operations under stated assumptions. The results are a third-party model, not evidence that each institution has adopted or published its own deficit forecast.
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The analysis focuses on cash and cash flows, rather than treating accounting net assets as money readily available to pay bills. Its baseline measure uses cash and equivalents and primary net cash flow, calculated as operating outcome plus depreciation, minus debt retirement and capitalized expenditures. The baseline estimate asks how long cash would last if the school continued its recent ordinary operations without extraordinary gifts, dramatic cuts, new debt, or growth. A separate maximum-staying-power measure counts unrestricted quasi-endowment investments as a possible backstop.
What did the model estimate for the West Coast group?
Under the authors’ three-year baseline staying-power threshold, the reported results were:
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| Scenario | West Coast institutions classed as at risk | Share reported |
|---|---|---|
| No enrollment decline | 13 of 27 | 48% |
| 10% enrollment decline | 17 of 27 | 63% |
These are modeled results for the 27-school comparison group, not counts of schools that publicly announced deficits. The analysis also discusses 44 New England institutions: it says 15 of those schools were already facing serious liquidity challenges or would do so shortly at current enrollment, based on audited fiscal-year 2024 results. Separately, first-time matriculations declined by an average of 8.8% between 2023 and 2024 at 27 of the 44 New England schools, according to IPEDS as reported by the authors. That 27-of-44 enrollment statistic is not the unnamed West Coast sample.
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Does “at risk” mean a college will close?
No. Falling below a staying-power threshold signals potential pressure to address liquidity; it does not establish that a school will close, merge, or declare financial exigency. The authors explicitly caution that institutions below their thresholds are not doomed to those outcomes. An institution might take other steps, and the model is not a certainty about what administrators will do or what future finances will look like.
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Using unrestricted quasi-endowment assets could extend a school’s runway, but repeatedly drawing on those assets to fund ordinary operations may weaken long-term sustainability. Baseline staying power and maximum staying power therefore answer different questions: how long cash alone may last, and how much longer a possible investment backstop could help.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Why enrollment matters to cash flow
For tuition-dependent colleges, fewer students can mean less tuition revenue while many operating costs remain. The 10% decline scenario illustrates how the modeled risk count changes when enrollment falls; it is a scenario, not a claim that every school in the sample experienced that decline. It also does not reveal which schools are in the group.
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Other coverage may discuss broader projections of financial risk across private colleges, but those analyses can use different institution populations and methods. They should not be used to infer the identities of Education Next’s unnamed West Coast schools or to treat its staying-power estimates as school-issued forecasts.
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