The Universidad TecMilenio (UTM) (TecMilenio University) is a private institution of higher education sponsored by the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education and specialized in both corporate training and short degree programs. Founded in 2002 in order to provide a cheaper alternative to the high costs involved at pursuing a degree at the Institute and fend-off foreign for-profit schools that have entered the country in recent years, the university serves some 21,000 students on its own at high school, undergraduate and postgraduate level, frequently through distance learning. Like most schools it now follows a semester model that replaced the original 4-month terms. As of 2009 the University has 40 small campuses distributed over several Mexican cities: Chiapas: Tapachula; Chihuahua: Camargo, Chihuahua, Cuauhtémoc, Cd.