The University of Wisconsin–Parkside (also known as UW–Parkside) is a four-year public university located in Kenosha and Somers, Wisconsin, in the center of the Chicago-Milwaukee Conurbation, and just two miles from the Lake Michigan shoreline. UW-Parkside is one of two universities in the UW System not named for the city in which it is located, the other being UW-Stout (following this naming convention UW-Parkside would be named UW-Kenosha). It is part of the University of Wisconsin System. The University of Wisconsin–Parkside was created by an act of the Wisconsin Legislature in 1965. The University was officially founded in July 1968 when it took over two-year UW centers in Kenosha and Racine. UW–Parkside broke ground for the new campus in November 1967 and accepted its first on-site students in fall 1969. The University was an original outgrowth of the University of Wisconsin–Madison, which expanded its educational offerings to the southeastern Wisconsin region with the opening of the 4-year institution. In 1971, when the University of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin State Universities merged, UW–Parkside became part of the University of Wisconsin System.