[3][4] The merger created regional clusters in which the two-year universities renamed and became branches of the comprehensive four-year campuses.
It would allow the system to maintain a higher education presence throughout the state's counties where college-aged students had dropped because of declining birthrates.
[5] The resulting merger also allowed students to freely transfer from a two-year campus to any four-year institution within the university system.
Following the spring 2023 semester, the University of Wisconsin-Platteville Richland became the first branch campus to close following the restructuring, citing enrollment decline.
The UW Colleges were also frequently used as a stepping stone in order to transfer to another institution in the University of Wisconsin System.