The financially ailing California College of the Arts (CCA) in San Francisco will close in 2027. Founded in 1907 in Berkeley, the school will sell its campus to Vanderbilt University. CCA is the only nonprofit, standalone art school in the city.
“I am writing to share an important update with you about the future of California College of the Arts: to support opportunities for our students to complete their education and to honor CCA’s significant role in the Bay Area’s creative ecosystem, we have entered into an agreement with Vanderbilt University,” says an announcement from the school’s president, David Howse, on its website.
“Under this agreement, CCA will wind down its current operations and will close by the end of the 2026-2027 academic year. Vanderbilt will then become the owner of the campus and will establish undergraduate and graduate programming, including art and design programs, at the campus. Vanderbilt also plans to operate a CCA Institute at Vanderbilt which will include, among other things, the Wattis Institute of Contemporary Arts, will maintain CCA archival materials, and will serve as a vehicle for CCA alumni engagement. Through these activities, Vanderbilt will honor CCA’s longstanding creative mission and maintain a strong presence for art and design education in the Bay Area.”
The school will continue teaching throughout the end of the 2026–27 school year, allowing some students to complete their degrees, Howse goes on to say, adding that the school will work on “transfer and completion pathways” at other accredited institutions for younger students.
“With declining enrollment, CCA’s tuition-driven business model is not sustainable,” says Howse’s statement. “Demographic shifts and a persistent structural deficit remain significant burdens on our ability to sustain current programs or grow new ones.”
The school had earned a reprieve with an infusion of tech cash in March 2025, when Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s foundation gave the school $22.5 million, matching the same amount raised by over 50 donors. That gift allowed the school to “plan more effectively for the future.”
The school has long faced a severe financial crisis. In 2024, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that the school faced a $20 million budget deficit amid a sharp decline in student enrollment.
The city also lost another century-old school when the San Francisco Art Institute, founded in 1871, filed for bankruptcy in 2023. It was the nation’s first art school west of the Mississippi.
CCA and SFAI are just the latest art schools to close. In 2024, the 150-year-old University of the Arts in Philadelphia shuttered with seven days’ notice. The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts has suspended all degree-granting programs. In 2023, the Art Institutes, a system of for-profit colleges, announced the closing of eight campuses nationwide.
