Former University of the Arts faculty, students and staff are still dealing with the impact of the school’s quick closure nearly nine months ago.
UArts filed for bankruptcy in September after a merger plan with Temple University failed. Since then, the school and its assets have been put up for sale to repay creditors. So far, eight of nine buildings have been auctioned off. One remaining building – Gershmen Hall – now has a leading bidder. If the bid is successful, this will be the last of nine buildings to sell.
In the first piece in this series, Billy Penn spoke with deans and program directors early last month about their transition into new careers, creative pursuits or part-time gigs following the school’s closure. The second piece of the series focused on staff members – with perspective from part-time faculty, adjunct professors and union members.
For this article, we talked to two more faculty and staff members about their experiences. While they are grateful for their new roles, they say it hasn’t been without hardship.
Stephanie Evans
WAS Former Learning Access Specialist at UArts
NOW Part-time Accessibility Specialist at Rowan University, full-time job hunting
Stephanie Evans had always loved music. While she pursued a Bachelor’s degree in environmental studies, and grew to be interested in other areas, she still retained a strong interest in music.
“While I was in undergrad, I kind of found a passion for working in higher education,” she said. “I still did music as an undergrad. I played French horn, and then I decided to go to grad school for higher education administration.”
When she graduated with a degree in higher education in May 2022, she found an open position at UArts. She felt the role would combine her love for music and the arts with her expertise in higher education.
“When I heard about UArts having a position open, I thought it was really nice, because I’ve always loved the arts, I’ve always loved music, and I really had a lot of thought into majoring in one of those fields, but it just wasn’t in the cards for me,” she said. “So it was nice to be able to think about being involved in the arts community.”
She said her position allowed her to get close with students and provide them with specialized help.
“I would help students with getting accommodations for their classes, and I would also provide individual coaching for students in terms of time management, organization, keeping up with classes, that sort of thing,” she said.
She said she heard about the UArts closure while she was on the way to a friend’s house. Evans explained it was difficult for her to be present after hearing the news.
“I just so happened to look at my phone and I saw an email from the union saying that we had lost our accreditation,” she said. “And I was like, ‘Oh, OK, that’s interesting.’ I shut my phone off, kind of ignored it, because we were five minutes away from my friend’s place. And then once we got to my friend’s place, I got another message, and it was the Inquirer article saying that we were going to be closed in seven days, and that’s when I just could not get off of my phone.”
Evans was expected to leave UArts by June 7 – just a week after the school announced its closure. She said she quickly found part-time work with an ex-colleague at Rowan University.
“My former boss reached out to me, the end of June or early July, saying that they had a part-time position open and that if I wanted, I could come back and be in that position. I didn’t have to stay, but I could continue to work there and then look for a full-time job while I was there,” she said. “So I kind of sat on it for about a month, tried to look for something more full-time, and then in August, I decided to take that part-time position, and I have kind of just been in that ever since.”
She hopes to find a full-time role. As for her former students and colleagues, Evans explained there is some variety in their experiences.
“Some of my students are doing fine,” she said. “They’ve adjusted well to the new colleges that they’ve gone to. Others graduated, and others are just trying to find their footing, still trying to figure out where to go. So I feel like it is kind of a flip-flop of what’s happening with students.”
She said the situation is also hard to commiserate with colleagues about – as everyone has felt the effects of it.
“It was hard talking with a lot of staff members,” she said. “Whenever we talked about it, it would just be kind of sad, almost like we didn’t want to talk about it.”
Evans wishes UArts would’ve offered more guidance throughout the transition.
“I never thought at this time last year that I would be not at UArts and that I would be in a part-time position because UArts closed,” she said. “So it really does frustrate me to know how quickly everything closed and how little guidance or help we got after the closure.”
Evans is grateful for the skills her part-time job is giving her, she said, and for the connections she made at UArts.
Jim Cowen
WAS Former Access Services and Music Librarian at UArts
NOW Works for some dude lol
Jim Cowen spent a long time with UArts – both as a student and a faculty member.
He started working at a library in high school, which inspired him to work at the UArts library when he started as a student there.
“My mother suggested I apply to the music library at UArts, which I did, and it was awesome, because they said, ‘Yeah, fill out an application. We’ll call you back,’ ” he said, “And as I was walking out, he was like, ‘You worked in the library before?’ and I was like, ‘I did,’ and he said, ‘Well, you’re hired.’ ”
Cowen worked at the UArts library for four years while attending school. He moved onto various positions within the UArts library after graduation, left the school to pursue work at other libraries for about a decade, then returned in 2014.
During this 10-year period from 2014 to 2024, Cowen explained he worked at UArts in several different capacities. From 2014 to 2019, he served as a music librarian.
“I worked as a music librarian, also the liaison to the musical theater department,” he said. “So, I continued expanding on their collections, I helped visit classes, anything that I could do for the departments there.”
He ended his time at UArts serving as a Community Access Services and Music Librarian – performing “front of house” duties.
Cowen said he heard about the UArts closure via a text from a friend. He was shocked.
“I think I just popped up and started pacing,” he said. “I’m like, ‘This can’t be real.’ My partner, she also went to UArts, graduated the same year, so we were both kind of like, ‘This is insane that the school closes on seven days’ notice.’ ”
Cowen said he was lucky with work. A company his department at UArts purchased from needed someone who would buy music in Philadelphia and ship it to California. When his current boss heard about the UArts closure, he reached out to Cowen’s department, and Cowen was able to assume the position within two weeks of UArts closing.
“So now they’re calling me a music librarian, but here what I kind of do is a hybrid of cataloging, so that libraries can get half-decent records, but then also combining what we’re going to see in the website,” he said.
Cowen is grateful his role keeps him “library adjacent.”
Despite this, he said he feels badly for his fellow UArts community. His biggest concern was, and is, for the students.
“We all just felt so bad for the students,” he said. “The library was very student-centric, and while we all had pity parties for ourselves, we just felt so bad for the students, and we hope that they all landed on their feet.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
