In March 2015, the board of trustees at Sweet Briar College, a liberal arts educational institution for women in Virginia, announced that the college would close. But alumnae stepped in and raised $12 million to keep the college open.
At the time the board voted to close the college in 2015, there were 641 full-time undergraduate students at Sweet Briar. But in the fall of 2017, there were just 79 first-year women on campus.
Sweet Briar subsequently announced a new curriculum, a new schedule that includes 12 weeks of class and three weeks of experiential learning each semester, and a substantial reduction in tuition.
The college has reported some encouraging news on enrollments. As of late June, a total of 129 new students have enrolled for the fall semester. This includes 114 new, first-year students and 15 transfer students. Thus, the number of new students on campus this fall will be at least 42 percent higher than was the case a year ago.