The Real Story Behind College Closures - Requiem for a College - 2nd edition (April 2025)
Jonathan Nichols self-published the first edition of Requiem for a College in 2022.
Here is the Amazon description of the book from 2022.
On February 3rd, 2017, Saint Joseph’s College, a small college in Rensselaer, Indiana, announced it would “suspend operations,” effectively ending an over 100 year history as a four-year college. While most of the world may not have taken notice, the day left a painful void in the lives of the College’s students, faculty, employees, alumni, and the surrounding community.
Requiem for a College is their story. Many books have examined the trend of small college closings. This one looks at what happens to the people involved.
Jonathan Nichols has drawn upon hundreds of hours of interviews conducted over five years as well as piles of documentation to determine exactly what happened at the college and in what ways the loss transformed so many lives. Not only that, but as Saint Joseph’s College is part of the ongoing wave of small college closures in America, Requiem for a College links Saint Joe to other colleges that have closed, showing commonalities as well as lessons for other institutions to heed.
Great tragedies often provoke conspiracy theories. In its reconstructed, definitive account of this institutional collapse, Requiem for a College demonstrates that causes of said tragedies are often more human and mundane than shadowy conspiracies, but are thus in their own way, much sadder.
The continuing pattern of college closures, layoffs and cutbacks that have occurred since 2017 inspired Jon to publish a second edition of the book. This second edition adds more stories about the personal and higher education impacts.
In the coming months, I will host additional episodes of the podcast to delve deeper into the stories of college closures for both the individuals involved and the colleges that have closed.
The second edition of Requiem for a College is scheduled for release in late 2025.
Here is the Amazon description of the book from 2022.
On February 3rd, 2017, Saint Joseph’s College, a small college in Rensselaer, Indiana, announced it would “suspend operations,” effectively ending an over 100 year history as a four-year college. While most of the world may not have taken notice, the day left a painful void in the lives of the College’s students, faculty, employees, alumni, and the surrounding community.
Requiem for a College is their story. Many books have examined the trend of small college closings. This one looks at what happens to the people involved.
Jonathan Nichols has drawn upon hundreds of hours of interviews conducted over five years as well as piles of documentation to determine exactly what happened at the college and in what ways the loss transformed so many lives. Not only that, but as Saint Joseph’s College is part of the ongoing wave of small college closures in America, Requiem for a College links Saint Joe to other colleges that have closed, showing commonalities as well as lessons for other institutions to heed.
Great tragedies often provoke conspiracy theories. In its reconstructed, definitive account of this institutional collapse, Requiem for a College demonstrates that causes of said tragedies are often more human and mundane than shadowy conspiracies, but are thus in their own way, much sadder.
The continuing pattern of college closures, layoffs and cutbacks that have occurred since 2017 inspired Jon to publish a second edition of the book. This second edition adds more stories about the personal and higher education impacts.
In the coming months, I will host additional episodes of the podcast to delve deeper into the stories of college closures for both the individuals involved and the colleges that have closed.
The second edition of Requiem for a College is scheduled for release in late 2025.