Penn State President Neeli Bendapudi joined the leaders of Pennsylvania’s three other state-related universities in Harrisburg on Wednesday for a state House Appropriations Committee budget hearing, where she faced at-times pointed questions and commentary about the decision to close seven Commonwealth Campuses.
Representatives queried Bendapudi on the transparency and justifications surrounding those decisions, as well as Penn State’s plans for transitioning the affected campuses. Penn State announced last spring that it will close the DuBois, Fayette, Mont Alto, New Kensington, Shenango, Wilkes-Barre and York campuses at the end of the 2026-27 academic year.
“I can’t help but feel that it’s super hypocritical that you’re here talking about Pennsylvania investing in Penn State when Penn State has turned its back on seven Commonwealth Campuses, including Penn State Fayette in my district,” said Rep. Charity Grimm Krupa, R-Fayette Co., a Penn State alumna. “These campuses aren’t just facilities on a map; they’re lifelines for working class students, economic anchors for rural communities and places where people who might never have had access to higher education were able to build a future.”
Grimm Krupa noted that the university is seeking a $49 million increase in the 2026-27 budget for a total general support appropriation of $291.1 million — an increase Penn State says it would use to freeze tuition for all undergraduates in 2027-28— but said the school “has approved hundreds of millions in discretionary spending,” including the Beaver Stadium renovation, former football coach James Franklin’s buyout and Bendapudi’s $450,000 raise last year.
“So I think it’s reasonable for taxpayers to ask if there is money for all that, why is there suddenly no money to keep our rural campuses open?” Grimm Krupa said.
As she did several other times throughout the three-hour hearing, Bendapudi said that the Penn State Athletic Department does not use state appropriations, tuition dollars or student fees.
“Unlike many universities that are compelled to, it’s completely self-sustaining,” Bendapudi said.
“That sounds like smoke and mirrors. It’s a shuffle game,” Grimm Krupa replied.
“I completely disagree,” Bendapudi answered.
Asked about the future of the nursing program at the Fayette campus, Bendapudi said administrators are “looking at every single campus and trying to do our very best in working with the communities,” but couldn’t comment specifically.
“It would be inappropriate for me to give an answer to any one program on a campus because the work is happening,” Bendapudi said. “We’re doing our very best to work with communities to keep them successful.”
Rep. Chad Reichard, R-Franklin Co., a Penn State alum whose district includes the Mont Alto campus, asked Bendapudi how legislators can reconcile appropriating funds to the university’s mission of being a “gateway to opportunity” when it is closing campuses.
“I cannot deny how painful it is to the community and to the individuals there,” Bendapudi said. “There’s nothing I can say that makes that go away because it’s true. It’s a very difficult decision to make. I will tell you that the lack of population in those campuses in those areas makes it very expensive for a Penn State degree to be there. We are working very hard…. We get less [state funding] today, even in nominal dollars, not accounting for inflation compared to the year 2000.”
She added that the decision allows the university to invest in other programs, such as rural health, that can maintain Penn State’s presence in those communities.
Asked about what she sees as Penn State’s obligation to the communities where the campuses are closing, Bendapudi said her administration is “meeting with the communities, trying to bring in private and public partners because we want these communities to be strong. We are truly committed to it.”
“We are working so hard, and in the next few months, hopefully you will see what they are,” she said.
Near the end of the hearing, committee minority chair James Struzzi, R-Indiana Co., raised Bendapudi’s response at the hearing a year ago when she said she did not know which campuses would close, but days later the university announced the 12 campuses that were under consideration.
“It’s a lack of transparency that we’re concerned about,” Struzzi said. “And so I point that out because I think it’s important that, as we move forward, we talk about these extensive taxpayer dollars that are going to higher education, that we are transparent and that we are forthright. Again, difficult decisions have to be made, but when we ask you specifically,
you say you don’t know, and then an announcement is made publicly, that’s something that I think is hard for us to understand.”
Bendapudi said she was asked at that hearing if Penn State was considering closing campuses and that she answered “all options are on the table.”
“The challenge for me was our board meeting was the 20th and 21st, and until the board met, we could not get ahead of them because everything has to be approved by them,” Bendapudi said. “At that time, the board agreed that 12 campuses would be under review. So I could not get in front of them… That was the dilemma of the timing, because truly, I cannot say what is going to happen until all of my bosses vote on it.”
Gov. Josh Shapiro proposed flat general support appropriations for all four state-related universities — Penn State, Pitt, Temple and Lincoln — as well as a $30-million performance-based funding allocation to be distributed to the schools based on defined metrics.
Bendapudi said several times that Penn State’s per-student appropriation is substantially lower than the other state-related universities and its Big Ten peers, and that state funding directly lowers tuition rates for Pennsylvania resident students. She also noted that the appropriation is lower than it was two decades ago.
“While in the same boat as other state-related institutions when it comes to stagnation in general support funding, Penn State has another hurdle to overcome in the disparity between our per-in-state-student funding rate, which still falls drastically below that of our peers,” she said.
Bendapudi also expressed enthusiasm for the performance-based funding.
“I have been a strong proponent of performance-based funding everywhere I’ve been because it ties the goals of the commonwealth, you as stewards of taxpayer dollars and our mission and what we are trying to do,” she said. “So, very, very supportive of it. Eventually, I hope performance-based funding — first we need to get the funding then we need to make it truly performance- based, and I am very proud of the bipartisan work that was done.”
