Pioneer Pacific College is shuttering three campuses and eliminating 131 jobs in a move college officials say was necessary due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. In an official filing with the state, the college pointed to “statewide operational restrictions put in place by [Oregon] Governor [Kate] Brown.” The filing said the rules led to a “dramatic loss of business” with no sense of “when business will return to normal.”
Pioneer Pacific is a for-profit private college with three programs in the Willamette Valley: in Springfield, Beaverton and the Oregon Culinary Institute in Portland. All three locations are shuttering, in what the filing called a “permanent closure … on July 31, 2020.”
Beaverton and Springfield offers similar courses, leaning heavily on health-related fields such as medical assisting, nursing and health care administration. Both campuses also have an associate’s degree for paralegals and a bachelor’s degree in business management. Those two sites are laying off a combined 90 employees.