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Struggling Keystone College in Pennsylvania announced a merger agreement Friday with the Washington Institute for Education and Research (WIER), a D.C.-based think tank established last year.
Keystone will be a subsidiary of WIER, according to the announcement. A college spokesperson said additional details will not be available on the merger until after regulatory reviews have been completed and approved. The unusual move comes amid recent business struggles at the college, which—like many institutions in Pennsylvania—has faced flagging enrollment in recent years, prompting layoffs in June.
Keystone reported 1,131 students in fall 2022, according to the latest federal data, a steep drop from its 1,600-to-1,700 enrollment range in the early 2010s.
Keystone’s accreditor, the Middle States Commission on Higher Education, which still has to approve the merger, has warned in recent months that the college faces “imminent closure.”
While a merger between a college and a think tank is unusual, WIER, founded last year, has been in conversation with Keystone about the deal for months. WIER is led by Ahmed Alwani, president of Fairfax University of America in Northern Virginia, formerly known as Virginia International University, which was almost shut down by state regulators in 2019.
VIU, which primarily enrolled international students, came under scrutiny for “rampant plagiarism” by students, grade inflation and online classes that were “patently deficient” and “lacking academic rigor,” according to findings by the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. VIU was also cited for admitting students with an “abysmally poor command” of English.
The university, accredited by the troubled Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools—which lost federal recognition in 2022—narrowly avoided closure by striking a deal with state regulators in 2019 to stop offering online education for at least three years.
VIU, which changed its name to Fairfax University of America in 2020, enrolled nearly 900 students in fall 2016, according to federal data. Last fall, the university enrolled 43 students, 91 percent of whom were from outside of the U.S., the latest federal data shows. Fairfax has a 10 percent graduation rate, according to federal data.
Alwani did not respond to a request for comment from Inside Higher Ed.
(This story has been updated to correct the acronym for the Washington Institute for Education and Research.)
