The athletic program is branded as the Parkside Rangers, and its teams wear forest green, black, and white.

Although designated a Senate bill, much of the political force behind the legislation came from Democratic Representative George Molinaro of Kenosha.

[6] In April 1966 a site-selection committee chose a 690-acre (280 ha) parcel of rolling farmland and woods near Petrifying Springs Park in Kenosha County as the site of the new southeastern University of Wisconsin campus, from around half a dozen alternative options.

The University of Wisconsin–Parkside was officially founded the following month, taking administrative control of the two-year UW centers in Racine and Kenosha.

In December, the Board of Regents named the administration building on Wood Road for Bernard Tallent, dean of the UW–Kenosha center from 1948 until his death in 1965.

Since then, the three researchers and others have received hundreds of thousands of dollars in further grants to study the effects of the communication system on living organisms.

In Summer 1972, UW–Parkside runner Lucien Rosa competed in the Olympic marathon in Munich, representing his home country of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka).

In March 1973, assistant life sciences professor Omar Amin discovered a new species of tiny parasitic worm in the Pike River and named it Acanthocephalus parksidei after the university.

Around the same time, UW–Parkside race walker Jim Heiring was the university's first to compete in the United States Olympic trials in the 20-kilometer walk, narrowly missing out on a place in the team.

The following September, the entire Biological Sciences Department was designated a Center of Excellence by the same board, and approval was granted for the university to offer a master's degree in applied molecular biology, including the study of advanced techniques in cloning, gene splicing and isolating traits on genetic material.

In April 1991, a human-protein experiment coordinated by Associate Chemistry Professor Z. Richard Korszun launched into orbit aboard Space Shuttle Atlantis.

In the fall of 1992, UW–Parkside history professor Thomas Reeves published A Question of Character: A Life of John F. Kennedy, which spent several weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list.

Coordinated by math professor Donald Piele, the competition is used to pick the United States team to compete in the annual International Olympiad in Informatics.

In 1994, in a project that grew from the university's 25th anniversary celebration, the UW–Parkside Nature Trail was created, including 10 geological and historical markers around the nearly 700-acre (280 ha) campus.

In the Fall of that year, International Business Machines (IBM) donated an AS/400 computer worth $353,000 to UW–Parkside as part of a program to increase the number of employees with experience on the server.

In the early years of the new millennium, UW–Parkside was one of 64 universities nationwide, and the only one in Wisconsin, to be designated as an "engaged campus" by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

Keating stepped down as chancellor in 2008, but his named successor, Robert Felner, was asked to resign in Summer 2008 before he had taken over the position, as he was involved in a federal criminal investigation into possible misuse of funds, related to his time as dean of the University of Louisville's College of Education and Human Development.

The university has had six chancellors:[7] Irvin G. Wyllie (1966–74), Alan Guskin (1975–85), Sheila Kaplan (1986–93), Eleanor J. Smith (1994–97), John P. Keating (1998–2008), and Deborah L. Ford (2009–2023)[8] UW–Parkside is a complex of buildings with the main academic buildings and its student center connected by skyways, where one walkway, that between the Student Center and Molinaro Hall, is nicknamed "The Bridge.

"[9][10] Nationally known architect Gyo Obata developed the campus master plan with a major library/learning center at its heart.

[11] The original buildings, constructed between 1967 and 1976, occupy a small portion of the 700-acre (283 ha) campus, which lies in Kenosha County.

The campus has hundreds of acres of restored prairies, mature oak and maple forests, and a meandering creek.

[12] UW–Parkside is organized into four colleges: UW–Parkside offers more than 30 undergraduate majors and graduate-level degrees in business, applied molecular biology, information systems, and sustainable management.

[13] The University Library, located in Wyllie Hall, houses a collection of over 380,000 volumes, 19,000 audio visual titles, 972,991 microform pieces, over 80,000 electronic books, maintains subscriptions to 1200 periodicals, and offers access to over 200 databases, most of which are available remotely.

In January 2011 Ranger Bear qualified for the first time for the Universal Cheer Association Mascot Nationals, where he took third place.