Sabine Martin
Since the Universities of Wisconsin started shuttering two-year branch campuses in 2023 amid steep enrollment declines, counties that own the buildings and land have been left to regroup and decide what’s next for the properties.
Meanwhile, they’re on the hook for maintaining what they still own. At a cost of thousands of dollars each month, that adds an urgency to counties’ efforts to redevelop the former campuses.
“We do not have the funds to sustain this on an ongoing basis,” Richland County Board Chair David Turk said of the former UW-Platteville Richland campus.
Each county that had a UW branch campus that has since closed is eligible for a grant of up to $2 million to redevelop the property under a state law.
The first branch campus of the UW system to shut down in decades was in November 2022 with the closure of UW-Platteville’s Richland branch campus, which officially closed in July 2023. Then in October 2023, the UW system said classes would end at UW-Milwaukee Washington County in West Bend and at UW-Oshkosh at Fond du Lac. The campuses closed in June 2024.
UW system leaders announced UW-Milwaukee Waukesha’s branch campus closure in March 2024, and it officially shuttered at the end of the last school year. In June 2024, UW officials announced it would shut down UW-Oshkosh’s campus in the Fox Cities, which closed a year later this June.
UW-Green Bay at Marinette announced in January 2024 it would end in-person classes, but it does offer some online courses.
Seven branch campuses remain open, including UW-Platteville Baraboo Sauk County, which announced in July it’s consolidating its campus footprint.
From charter schools to performing arts centers, here’s what counties are doing with the six that no longer offer classes on their campuses.
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Marinette campus stops in-person classes
In January 2024, the UW system announced it would suspend in-person classes at the branch campus by that spring, although some online classes are still offered.
UW-Green Bay spokesperson Janet Bonkowski said the university is working with the Marinette community to offer theater and arts events on the campus.
The university is maintaining facilities under the obligations of the current lease with Marinette County, Bonkowski said.
Marinette County and donors also funded a $600,000 renovation to the Herbert L. Williams Theatre and the Fine Arts Gallery.
In May, the Marinette County Board approved the sale of the Marinette campus’s fieldhouse and 18.6 acres of land surrounding it for $1 to the Greater Marinette-Menominee YMCA.
The county plans to use $500,000 of its $2 million from the state to make improvements to the facility.
To read the full story, please follow this link: What’s happening with UW System’s shuttered branch campuses?