For many, a college campus is a lively place of movement. You move from class to class, to your friends, to a party, and to the next phase of your life. It’s unsettling to think of a university as abandoned, since it’s a denial of that movement and its very essence. While the United States has some of the world’s best universities and scenic college towns among its nearly 6,000 higher education facilities, the country is also filled with closed, defunct, and abandoned schools.
There are a number of reasons why a college closes: financial difficulties, loss of accreditation (preventing the enrollment of new students), and a decline in enrollment overall. And, of course, none of these factors were helped by the COVID-19 pandemic. There’s also the issue of the “demographic cliff” reached in 2025. Less people have been having kids since the 2007 recession, and as of 2025, there will be fewer college-aged students than in earlier decades. Add to that higher costs of housing and food, a declining belief in the value of a college degree, and government initiatives discouraging international students from attending U.S. schools, and you’ve got a recipe for disaster.
When schools close, they may merge with other colleges to stay open under a different banner. Some are completely demolished to make way for something new. Others are left abandoned, their deteriorating campuses stuck in limbo. The locations on this list are all historic and deserted, though a few have been bought. They may not have had the enrollment numbers of bigger institutions, but still, they once thrived as social and economic hubs of their communities.
Atlantic Union College – Lancaster, Massachusetts
An hour outside of the breathtaking parks and nature of Boston stand the empty buildings of a college founded by the Seventh Day Adventist Church in 1882. One of the country’s oldest Seventh Day Adventist colleges and home to the first building constructed by the church, Atlantic Union offered bachelor’s degrees in theology/religion and health science/biology, as well as certification programs for students to pursue occupations as bookkeepers, pharmacy technicians, and medical office assistants…