The University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee (UW–Milwaukee, UWM, or Milwaukee) is a public urban research university in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States.[4] It is the largest university in the Milwaukee metropolitan area and a member of the University of Wisconsin System. It is also one of the two doctoral degree-granting research universities and the second largest university in Wisconsin.
The university consists of 14 schools and colleges,[5] including the only graduate school of freshwater science in the U.S.,[6] the first CEPH accredited dedicated school of public health in Wisconsin,[7] and the state's only school of architecture.[5] As of the 2015–2016 school year, the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee had an enrollment of 27,156, with 1,604 faculty members,[5] offering 191 degree programs, including 94 bachelor's, 64 master's and 33 doctorate degrees.[5]
The university is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity".[8] In 2018, the university had a research expenditure of $55 million.[9]
The university's athletic teams are the Panthers. A total of 15 Panther athletic teams compete in NCAA Division I. Panthers have won the James J. McCafferty Trophy as the Horizon League's all-sports champions seven times since 2000. They have earned 133 Horizon League titles and made 40 NCAA tournament appearances as of 2016[update].[5]
In 1885, the Wisconsin State Normal School opened for classes at 18th and Wells in downtown Milwaukee. The first president was John Mapel, an alumnus of the University of Wisconsin Madison who had previously been the superintendent of schools in Iowa. His ideas for the curriculum were largely influenced by a tour he had made in Europe prior to his job in Iowa.[citation needed] Over the next 42 years, the Milwaukee State Normal School saw seven different presidents, the addition of music and liberal arts programs and rapid growth from an initial enrollment of 76. In 1919, the school moved from downtown to the current location near the lakefront when a new building, now Mitchell Hall, was completed. In 1927, the Milwaukee normal school changed its name to Wisconsin State Teachers College-Milwaukee in an effort by the State Normal School Regents to refocus on the instruction of teachers. The college became one of the nation's top teacher's training colleges in the 1940s. In 1951, the Legislature empowered all state colleges to offer liberal arts programs.[10] The Milwaukee State Teachers College subsequently became Wisconsin State College–Milwaukee, but was still casually referred to as "Milwaukee State," as it had been throughout its previous incarnations; also retaining the green and white school colors and Green Gulls mascot.[11]
University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee was founded with the belief that Milwaukee needed a great public university to become a great city.[12] In 1955, the Wisconsin state legislature passed a bill to create a large public university that offered graduate programs in Wisconsin's largest city. In 1956, Wisconsin State College-Milwaukee merged with the University of Wisconsin–Extension's Milwaukee division (a graduate branch of the University of Wisconsin–Madison) to form the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee.[13] The new university consisted of the WSC campus near the lakefront and the University of Wisconsin extension building in downtown Milwaukee. The first commencement of the new University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee was held on June 16, 1957. On June 13, 1958, Socialist mayor Frank P. Zeidler was the first person to receive an honorary doctorate from the university.
In 1964, the campus of the neighboring private women's institution, Milwaukee-Downer College, was purchased by the state to expand the UWM campus; Milwaukee-Downer College had previously merged with Lawrence College to form the present Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin.[14] The university had already purchased the former campuses and buildings of the former Milwaukee-Downer Seminary and Milwaukee University School along Hartford Avenue.[15]
From 1956 to 1971, UW–Milwaukee, UW–Madison, and the latter's affiliated 10 freshman-sophomore centers and statewide extensions (University of Wisconsin–Extension) were part of the original University of Wisconsin System. In 1971, the state legislature merged this entity with the Wisconsin State Universities to form a united University of Wisconsin System under a single board of regents. In 1988, the UW System designated eight Centers of Excellence at UWM. In 1994, UWM was designated a Research II University (now a Doctoral/Research University-Extensive) by the Carnegie Foundation.[16]
UWM has expanded to 12 schools and colleges and now offers 88 undergraduate programs and 48 graduate programs, including 22 doctoral degree programs, with a university-wide focus on academic research, teaching and community service. In 2005, UW–Milwaukee surpassed UW–Madison in the number of Wisconsin resident students and became the university with the largest enrollment of Wisconsin residents.[17]
In 2006, UW–Milwaukee was ranked as the ninth best "Saviors of Our Cities" by the New England Board of Higher Education (NEBHE), because of its strong positive contribution of careful strategic planning and thoughtful use of resources that have dramatically strengthened the economy and quality of life of Milwaukee,[18] and was voted by the public as one of the top ten "Gems of Milwaukee".[19]
In 2008 and 2009, the school saw the establishments of the School of Public Health and the School of Freshwater Sciences. In 2010, UW–Milwaukee purchased its neighboring Columbia St. Mary's Hospital complex. In the early 2011, UW-Milwaukee closed the land purchase for its Innovation Park in Wauwatosa.
The 104-acre (42 ha) UWM campus is located in a residential area on Milwaukee’s upper East Side. The campus is five blocks from the shoreline of Lake Michigan, and is less than a ten-minute drive from downtown Milwaukee. The Milwaukee County Transit System provides the campus with access to public bus transportation in Milwaukee. The campus is divided into central, north, west, and northwest quads. In addition to the campus proper, UWM incorporates a large number of other sites throughout the Milwaukee metropolitan area.
The north end of the Central Quad is the UWM Golda Meir Library, a major library of the country. The library consists of three parts: the West Wing, East Wing and the conference center on the top level of the East Wing. The West Wing and the East Wing were completed in 1967 and 1974 separately. The two structures are joined by passageways in the basement and on the second and third floors. The northern extensions of the East and West Wings and a fourth floor conference center facility were completed in 1987. In 1979, the Library was named for Golda Meir, the fourth Prime Minister of Israel, who attended Milwaukee State Normal School, a UWM predecessor institution.
The south end of the Central Quad is anchored by the UWM Student Union, the center of student and campus life for UWM. At 350,000 square feet (33,000 m2), the Student Union is one of the largest student centers in the nation, and its 26,000 plus visitors a day during the spring and fall academic terms makes the Union one of the busiest buildings in Wisconsin on a daily basis. Golda Meir Library on the north and the Student Union on the south are connected by the Ernest Spaights Plaza, the central commons for UWM and the roof level of the 480 vehicle Union parking structure. Overtowering the Ernest Spaights Plaza to the west is Bolton Hall which houses the Departments of Sociology, Anthropology, Political Science, Economics, Urban Studies, and Geography, as well as many student support centers including the Student Success Center and the Office of Undergraduate Research (OUR).
West of Bolton Hall is Lubar Hall, home of Sheldon B. Lubar School of Business. This four-story facility consists of 150,000 square feet (14,000 m2) of classroom, computer labs and office space and can accommodate 2,000 students in its instructional facilities at one time. Originally constructed in 1995 as the Business Administration Building, it was renamed in 2006, Lubar Hall in honor of Sheldon B. Lubar, a prominent Milwaukee businessman, civic leader and philanthropist. Lubar is founder and chairman of Lubar & Company, Inc., a private investment firm. His commitment to UWM and higher education spans more than three decades including service as a past president of the University of Wisconsin System Board of Regents. Lubar's distinguished career of public service also includes his work as Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and Commissioner of the Federal Housing Administration. The building's original automated light and temperature controls featured a system called The Lighting Showcase by the Wisconsin Electric Power Company. It was designed to provide maximum energy efficiency for the most highly utilized academic building on the UWM campus. In addition to providing nearly 200 offices, there are three lecture halls, with a total of 785 seats; seven arc-shaped classrooms; ten U-shaped classrooms; an Executive MBA classroom; three computer labs; and two levels of underground parking. In 2023, Jeff Yabuki was named the Sheldon B. Lubar executive-in-residence.[20]
On the east side of the Ernest Spaights Plaza are the Art building, Music building, and the Theatre building which are all indirectly connected through a series of basement hallways, and on the second floor. These buildings make up what is part of the Peck School of the Arts. Main buildings on the east side of the central quad include Mitchell Hall, sometimes known as "Old Main," which was the home of the original Milwaukee State Teachers College; Garland and Pearse Halls (which formerly housed Milwaukee-Downer Seminary); Curtin Hall; etc.
The north side of the North Quad contains the Downer Woods, a wooded area and conservation center. On the west side of North Quad are the Sandburg Residence Halls, a complex comprising four high-rise dormitories. Sandburg Residence Hall houses about 2,700 students.
In the central part of North Quad, there are the school's indoor sports facilities the Klotsche Center and its new addition the Pavilion. Next to the indoor sports facilities is Chapman Hall and the 11-story Enderis Hall, which houses the College of Health Sciences, School of Education, and the Helen Bader School of Social Welfare.
The east side of the North Quad is a group of old red buildings, including Holton Hall, Merrill Hall, Johnston Hall, Sabin Hall, and others. These older buildings were acquired by the university in the Milwaukee-Downer College campus purchase.[21] The Milwaukee-Downer "Quad" (Holton, Johnston, Merrill and Greene Halls) was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1974.[22]
The West Quad is the location for the College of Engineering and Applied Science, the College of Nursing, the School of Architecture and Urban Planning, and the natural science departments. The College of Engineering and Applied Science is housed in the EMS building. The Physics Building is to the south, and the Chemistry Building and Lapham Hall (housing the Biology and Geosciences Departments, as well as the Thomas A. Greene Memorial Museum) are to the east. Cunningham Hall on the northwest side houses the College of Nursing.
The award-winning Architecture and Urban Planning Building on the east side of the West Quad was completed in 1993. With more than 143,000 square feet (13,300 m2), it is one of the largest school of architecture buildings built in the U.S. in the last forty years. The exterior of the L-shaped building has brick walls accented by metal panels and large windows. Full glass walls facing onto the central courtyard afford a view of that area from almost every room in the building. Inside, the air ducts, light fixtures and structural system have been left exposed, providing a unique architectural teaching environment. The building includes student design studios, classrooms, a lecture hall, exhibition areas, computer labs, offices, a media and photography center, and research centers.
In October 2015, the university unveiled the Kenwood Interdisciplinary Research Complex, a distinctive 141,000 square-foot building at a cost of $80 million.[23][24]
In May 2019, UWM opened the UWM Lubar Entrepreneurship Center and UWM Welcome Center in a new $8.3 million building, sitting just south of the Kenwood Interdisciplinary Research Complex.[25]
Surrounded by the buildings in the West Quad is Engelmann Stadium, home to the Milwaukee Panthers men's and women's soccer teams. Built in 1973, the 2,000-capacity stadium is tucked between buildings in the middle of the West Quad, making it a unique stadium among American sports venues. Engelmann Stadium is home to the longest-running in-season tournament in NCAA Division I men's soccer, the Panther Invitational. UWM has hosted the event annually since the program's inception in 1973, save for the 1990 season. The tournament entered its 38th year in 2012.[26]
The former Columbia-St.Mary's hospital was acquired in 2010. It contains a seven-building complex, with over 820,000 square feet (76,000 m2) and a parking structure, expanding the campus by 20 percent.[27] Currently, the building houses the School of Information Studies, UWM's child care center, the Biological Sciences Greenhouse, and numerous departments' offices. The uses of the remaining portions of the complex are yet to be determined, although the university said in 2020 that it would raze Building A, the former Columbia Hospital building.[28] The demolition began in spring 2022 after the covid-19 pandemic delayed the project. The former east wing is currently called Building A, west wing as Building B, Clinical Building as Building C, and the Medical Arts Building as Building D.