Oprah Winfrey said the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls will end operations in its current form at the close of 2027, turning one of her signature education efforts toward a wider scholarship model. The shift keeps the campus in the story for now, but it changes the business of what the academy is meant to do next.
Winfrey opened the school in 2007 and has since seen more than 1,000 students graduate, with most moving on to higher education. She said, “The dream was never simply to build a school. It was to invest in the limitless potential of young women,” and added that her mission “doesn't end with one campus. It continues in every girl whose future can be transformed through education.”
2007 to 2027
The academy will graduate two more classes before the change takes effect, giving current students a runway rather than a sudden cutoff. After that, the provincial government will take over the facility, while the school’s current form ends at the close of 2027.
Winfrey personally invested hundreds of millions in the campus, and she told PEOPLE in 2019, “This school is my greatest legacy.” That line now reads less like a closing statement than a marker of how the project is being repurposed: the physical school is giving way to a broader education strategy.
Scholarships Beyond One Campus
Remaining students will move to other top-tier schools with tuition fully covered through graduation, which means the academy’s role shifts from housing and teaching a fixed cohort to financing education elsewhere. The new scholarship model is expected to roughly double the number of girls served, a bigger reach without expanding the campus itself.
That is the real tradeoff in Winfrey’s plan. The academy ends in its current form even though her mission stays intact, and the next phase depends on scholarship access rather than one building carrying the whole program.
What Changes After 2027
For families and students, the practical shift is straightforward: the current campus remains active through two more graduating classes, then the facility changes hands and the education support moves outward. The unanswered issue is the structure of the scholarship program itself, which will determine how the larger reach is delivered and which girls benefit first.
