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News Release April 10, 2013

For Immediate Release:

The CVA Board of Trustees has concluded with great sadness that efforts to keep the College open next year are not viable.

In the face of ongoing financial difficulties that we have been unable to overcome, CVA has been implementing a teach-out program focused on three critical objectives for our current students: to provide the high quality education they all deserve from CVA, to graduate our seniors with a recognized Bachelor of Fine Arts degree, and to arm our freshmen, sophomores and juniors with the full credits they have earned so they may continue their education.In conjunction with the teach-out program, CVA’s Board of Trustees has been working toward an orderly wind-down of the College’s operations with the goals of meeting our financial obligations, providing scholarship support for transferring students, and offering reasonable severance packages to our faculty and staff.

Over the last three months, CVA Action has worked hard to develop a plan and secure new sources of funding to keep the school open beyond this spring. The Board of Trustees and CVA Action representatives have communicated frequently throughout this period, and the Trustees have heard directly from students, faculty, and alumni about their love for CVA. We have thoughtfully considered these perspectives while weighing the difficult and complex challenges posed by the College’s longstanding financial difficulties, federal regulations related to student aid, the requirements of accrediting bodies, and other issues.

Last Tuesday, CVA Action asked the Board of Trustees to consider an updated operating plan that CVA Action had revised from earlier drafts. CVA Action also requested that we expand the Board of Trustees to include a slate of nominees they had recruited. A few days later, CVA Action let us know that a key source of financing for their plan had fallen through and that we were unlikely to receive the substantial infusion of cash that would have been needed in a matter of weeks.As a result, CVA Action changed its request and asked the Board of Trustees to join with CVA Action in making a plea to the public to meet a two-week fundraising goal that would be sufficient to allow the school to remain open next year.

The Board of Trustees met on Tuesday, April 9, to consider the request to make a joint fundraising plea.

Following our meeting, we offered to ask the community for sufficient funding within two weeks so that CVA could (1) preserve its buildings and other physical assets and (2) spend a year (or more) engaging a larger board and outside experts to explore options and develop a new, financially sound business model. Our offer included a condition that CVA would not enroll any students for the 2013-2014 school year. We insisted on this condition to ensure that current students would take advantage of favorable transfer options and not be left without support next year if a new business model failed to emerge. Unfortunately, the condition was not acceptable to CVA Action.

The Board of Trustees is grateful to the members of CVA Action for their hard work, commitment, and love for the College—a love that is clearly shared by our students, faculty, alumni, and all of us who have given our time and financial resources in its service. We are deeply saddened by the developments of the past eight months but remain resolved that closing at the end of the current school year is necessary to protect the interests of our current students and other stakeholders. With this in mind, we urge students to pursue transferring to schools that will continue to nurture their passion for art and design and help launch their careers as leaders of our creative community.