Pig Iron School will pause its fall semester following UArts closure

Following the unexpected closure of University of the Arts last month, Philadelphia’s Pig Iron School will pause its master of fine arts program in the fall. The school, which offered the program jointly with UArts, hopes to resume the MFA program in January 2025, when it plans to secure a partnership with a different accredited institution.

“After six weeks of crisis planning, fundraisers, and careful consideration of the myriad possible paths forward for Pig Iron after University of the Arts’ abrupt closure, we have come to a very difficult decision: we are not able to reopen the Pig Iron School this fall and must pause our graduate program for at least a semester,” Quinn Bauriedel, co-artistic director and cofounder of Pig Iron Theatre Company, wrote in a statement.

The decision will impact 35 students enrolled in the MFA program, who normally pay tuition and receive degrees from UArts but take classes at Pig Iron. UArts typically reimburses Pig Iron for program costs each quarter, but now with around $300,000 in unpaid expenses from the last two quarters, Pig Iron faces serious financial trouble. Bauriedel says Pig Iron has retained pro bono legal counsel at Duane Morris and is considering pursuing legal action. If UArts declares bankruptcy, it may take years for the physical theater and dramatic storytelling school to recover those funds.

In June, UArts officials said that the school did not appear to have enough money to pay workers the minimum owed them under federal law. Earlier this month, United Academics of Philadelphia officials filed new charges with the National Labor Relations Board over UArts’ failure to bargain over pay and benefits for the workers who remained employed after the college abruptly closed.

“We’ve heard nothing about any plan for payment from anyone,” Bauriedel told The Inquirer. “This is a huge part of our annual budget. It’s money that we already spent.” Pig Iron’s budget ranges from $1.3 to $1.8 million.

Pig Iron has been in talks with schools over partnership all over the region, including University of Pennsylvania, Temple University, Villanova, Drexel University, and Bryn Mawr College. Bauriedel is also in talks with Carnegie Mellon University and University of North Carolina Wilmington. While there has been some progress, Bauriedel didn’t want to rush the process. Higher education institutions, he said, move slowly but he did not want to leave students in limbo any longer than necessary.

“A partnership is delicate, and it needs to have a lot of trust, and a lot of time to work out the many details. To just do a rush job would not have been a good idea, likely, in the long run, and I think our students understand that,” he said. Bauriedel had hoped to revive the certificate program and transfer MFA students over, but he said that there wasn’t enough interest because it could not offer the same financial aid and international student visas.

“We are going to do what we can, as an organization, to try to shore things up. We’ve been doing an emergency fundraising campaign to try to keep the lights on and keep our staff hired,” said Bauriedel. “We are hopeful that we will be able to put some kind of partnership together by January. For the students, it essentially means taking a semester gap.”

At the moment, the school is fundraising to recoup the $300,000 owed by UArts. Bauriedel said he’s received an outpouring of support from the local community, raising $140,000 through matching gifts.

The future, however, continues to be uncertain. As much as the team continues to make future plans nothing is certain,” he said.

Pig Iron, Bauriedel added, will not be able to hire the usual 10 to 12 adjunct faculty members it employs each semester. Instead, the school will offer a workshop series in the fall called “The B Sides” with classes in acting, moving, and acrobatics. He hopes all the students will return in January.

“My hope is that they will be willing to stick it out with us. There are very few programs like what we offer and they’ve bonded with the community,” said Bauriedel. “I also understand that all of this disruption does not create a lot of faith in higher institutions. Some may want to go elsewhere or they may want to find another artistic path outside of school.”

Despite the school’s challenges, their show will go on: Pig Iron Theatre Company is currently working on its new production, Poor Judge, a cabaret set to the music of alt-rock singer-songwriter Aimee Mann. It will premiere at the Wilma Theater in September.