About
History
From a nineteen-student manual training school to a seven-college polytechnic university, in six moves.
1893 – The charter
The Wesconsin legislature charters the Porter Manual Training School with an appropriation of $12,000 and an enrollment, that first winter, of nineteen students. The founding mission — trades and applied science taught alongside a basic academic curriculum — has not changed much in 130 years, even as almost everything else has.
1912 – Founders Hall
The school's first permanent building opens on the site of the old fairgrounds. Founders Hall still stands, still holds classes, and still has the original 1912 machine shop floor beneath three later renovations.
1937 – Wesconsin Polytechnic Institute at Porter
The school is rechartered as a four-year institute and begins granting bachelor's degrees, starting with engineering and industrial education. Enrollment passes 800 for the first time.
1971 – Joining the UW System
Under the statewide merger that consolidates Wesconsin's public universities, the Institute becomes University of WesconsinPorter Falls, gaining university status and a seat in the System alongside the other Wesconsin campuses.
1994 – The Ironclads
Athletics teams, previously the Porter Millwrights, are renamed the Ironclads after a student vote — a nod to the state's WWII-era shipbuilding history rather than the school's own, since Porter never built a boat larger than a rowing shell. Nobody has seriously proposed changing it back.
2026 – Today
Seven colleges, 50 programs, and an enrollment of 8,412 — a nine-year high. The founding manual training mission is still visible in the numbers: every undergraduate program still requires hands-on work with an outside partner before graduation.
Take the next step.
Applications for fall are open. No fee, no essay, and a decision in about two weeks.